


Sleeping Sickness

by spacemonkey766



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Brainwashing, Drama, Electroconvulsive Therapy, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Explicit Language, Father-Son Relationship, Hallucinations, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Kidnapping, M/M, Psychological Torture, Psychological Trauma, Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-06
Updated: 2018-09-06
Packaged: 2019-07-07 13:48:59
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 7
Words: 26,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15909480
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacemonkey766/pseuds/spacemonkey766
Summary: Dick Grayson gets abducted out of costume and neither the Batman nor his team knows where and how to save him. But whoever has him knows his secret alter-ego and on the brink of madness from psychological torture, Dick is having a hard time clinging to his own identity.(Contains slash between Conner and Dick & is heavy on father/son dynamic between Bruce & Dick)





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Shameless Conner Kent/Dick Grayson slasher. Title and chapter themes inspired by the song "Sleeping Sickness" by City and Colour.

It was dark as Dick tried to shake the fog from his head as he awoke, a shooting pain stretched from temple to temple. He instinctively tried to raise his hand up to his forehead but found he couldn’t move his arm.

The realization that he was unable to move any of his limbs brought him out of his waking daze with a jolt that he felt in the pit of his stomach. He took stock of the sensations of his body, realizing he was stripped bare other than what felt like scrubs pants on his lower half. He was partially lying reclined in some kind of padded chair; it reminded him of the type of chair you sit in at the dentist’s office. The feel of cloth tied tightly around his eyes coupled with the fact he couldn’t see a damn thing meant he was blindfolded. He could feel a strap buckled across his waist, tightly securing Dick to the chair like a seat belt. A flex of his arms revealed he was fastened to the armrests at his wrists and elbows. He could feel one stretched tightly over his upper arms and chest, as well as a strap, fastened around his neck, restricting all upper body movement. His legs were secured to the elevated leg rests at his ankles, over his knees, and his thighs.  
Dick was trapped.

He could feel a mass of something that felt like foam or sponge in his mouth, soft enough that it compressed slightly as he moved his jaw but effectively filled the entire cavity from tongue to teeth to roof of his mouth. The pressure over his lips and around the portion of his lower face let Dick know spitting it out was not an option. It felt like the straps restraining the rest of his body and Dick knew he was securely gagged.

Judging by the smells and the very faint sounds of city life in the distance, Dick figured he was in some abandoned location, the musty and rotting smell a dead giveaway. His heart was beating violently in his chest as he tried to remain calm; trying to remember what had happened leading up to this moment but his brain was still foggy.

Hours passed by after Dick first waking up in unfamiliar surroundings and all of Dick’s near-constant struggling did nothing except exhaust his body, making his muscles sore, and chafe his skin. Wriggling his feet, twisting his wrists, and turning his head slightly was about the limited range of motion he had. He sagged back after his latest failed attempt at freedom, an exhausted sigh sealed behind the oppressive gag, his jaw throbbing slightly.

The sound of an opening a door made Dick aware he was no longer alone and the sound of footsteps as the stranger entered the room sent a nervous chill that wracked his body. Dick lay motionless as he heard someone approach and couldn't help himself as his body recoiled at the touch of a latex-gloved hand, reaching behind his head and tugging on the knot of the blindfold at the back of his skull.

“Well hello, Mr. Grayson,” a warped mechanical voice greeted as his blindfold was removed. Dick blinked in the abrupt brightness, frantically trying to focus on the figure hovering above him. The blinding light was coming from above, a mounted operating light shining in his face. Dick shifted his gaze from the lamp to the man hovering above him. Dick noticed that he wore a lab coat over a three-piece suit, a surgical mask hid the bottom portion of his face, obviously housing a voice changer based on the voice he just heard. Glasses with mirrored lenses covered his eyes, a reflection of Dick’s own face with a strap stretched over his mouth and buckled tightly behind his head, sealing his mouth from nostrils to chin, staring back at him. Every inch of the man’s skin was covered, no distinguishable features present, no way of Dick getting even a hint of who it was holding him captive.

Dick tried to crane his neck as far as the strap securing him to the chair would allow, taking stock of the room. It was a drab, rundown, bare room containing only the padded dentist-like chair he was bound to, a cabinet, a few rolling carts stocked with unfamiliar devices and equipment, a stool and some chairs in the corner. Above him, attached to the extension arm of the operating light was a small mounted flat television screen.

“Now, Mr. Grayson, you’re probably wondering why you’re here, among other questions I’m sure,” his captor spoke again, as he paced around the chair slowly. “Well, there are a few things we should start with. First off, I will not be introducing myself, I’d rather keep anonymity on my side if you don’t mind. You can just refer to me as your Doctor. That being said, I know who you are, Richard Grayson; orphan circus performer, ward and adopted son of the philanthropical yet dimwitted Bruce Wayne, as well as the Gotham’s former Boy Wonder and current vigilante bird Nightwing.”

Dick fought down a reaction, not wanting to show the shock in his eyes at the revelation from his captor. The masked man just chuckled and grabbed a nearby rolling stool, moving to sit to the left of Dick. He reached into his lab coat pocket and pulled out a scalpel.

“I don’t expect you to neither confirm nor deny what I’m saying. Despite you being gagged I don't imagine that you would even if you were participating in this conversation. But, Mr. Grayson,” the captor leaned over him with the scalpel and with expert gentle pressure pressed the blade into Dick’s upper left chest, “I do know this to be true. In fact, I know a few of you and your comrades’ identities. Never mind how I do, but you should know your alter egos our of little interest to me. Just keep in mind that I do know, and I hold the power in this dynamic.”

Dick couldn't stop the sharp intake of breath through his nostrils and the shout of pain smothered by the gag as the Doctor carved an ‘R’ in an oval, reminiscent and almost in the same location as the former insignia he wore during his Robin days.

Dick breathed through the pain and tried to ignore the bleeding cut on his chest, and just stared up at the Doctor, straining hard at his bindings, twisting and bucking against them as the Doctor pocketed the bloody scalpel.  
“Secondly, I want you to know that I will always be honest with you about your treatments and what's happening to you. I want to show you some respect and inform you of what you’re about to endure because I do respect you, Richard. You’ve done a lot of good for our fair city.”

The Doctor stood from his stool and moved to one of the carts, picking up a file folder before returning to his seat.  
“Over the course of our time together, you will be put through a rather rigorous treatment plan. I’ll be honest, Mr. Grayson, my intention is to break you. I want to push the boundaries of hypnotics, mind manipulation, and brainwashing and fracture your delicate reality,” the doctor spoke steady and casually, never looking up from his file chart as if he was merely telling Dick to take two and call him in the morning.

“You see, through extensive research it was deduced that you seem to be the most trusted amongst your peers. In addition to your escapades with your own alliance of younger heroes, you have been seen working with practically every member of the Justice League. You are young, not as experienced as the more established members of our Hero society. This makes you the perfect candidate to test a few theories. Ideally, we will manipulate your mind into thinking the League has been compromised and are the enemy or, at the very least, shatter your perceptions and faith in them. That in itself would be an invaluable triumph and could lead to a much bigger trial of turning society against their would-be saviors. The most favorable scenario is to see if we can turn you against them, turn you into a Trojan Horse if you will. The worst case scenario is all we accomplish is some physical and psychological torture. Now, doesn’t that sound like a good time?”

It was with that question that the Doctor closed the file and looked to his captive. Dick strained in his bindings, fists clenched tightly as they pulled at the wrist bindings, knees shaking as he pushed up at the straps, struggling to try to move any of his body to no avail.  
“Oh Richard, it really is no use. I know your instinct is to fight but you should be more excited than fearful! You see this is really just one big experiment. And as a man of science, I know I am excited. I don’t know if this will be successful. I don’t even know if it will do anything more than cause you great pain. But what I do know is it’s going to be a lot of fun.”


	2. I think I'm breaking down

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I awoke only to find my lungs empty,  
> And through the night so it seems I'm done breathing,  
> And now my dreams are nothing like they were meant to be,  
> And I'm breaking down,  
> I think I'm breaking down.

24 hours prior

“No Con. I’ve got calculus homework, I have to restock my belt, and I have to finish my research paper for Biology all before patrol tonight. I’m not coming to the mountain,” Dick rolled his eyes as he spoke, hands in his pockets, backpack slung over one shoulder, chatting to his teammate over the comlink. He was just leaving Hudson University, walking to his motorcycle so he could head to Wayne Manor to do his homework in peace. It also just happened to be a Wednesday which meant Alfred would probably be baking something special and Dick was hoping to sway the butler into making Caraway Seed Cake. Alfred had made it on Dick’s second day of living with at the Manor after Bruce and Alfred took him in and Dick had been hooked on it ever since.

“C’mon Grayson, we can do a little biology research of our own. Tonight’s lesson, anatomy,” Conner chuckled on the other end, unable and unwilling to resist flirting with the twenty-year-old hero while he thumbed absently through a magazine, stretched out on the couch in the rec area of Mount Justice. 

“I think I’ve been a bad influence on you these past few years,” Dick laughed, “and that’s not an invitation for another lewd joke. Any more of those and I might have to start calling you Wally.”

“What about after patrol?” Conner all but begged. The two young men were about eight months into their relationship, a year if you counted the four months spent secretly hooking up in any nook and cranny of the Mount Justice they could find before making it official. After Conner and M’gann broke up three years into them being a team, Conner and Dick had spent years of back and forth flirting, and had become friends with benefits between failed relationships with other team members. But almost a year ago something changed between them; those four months spent hooking up had sparked something deep within them and they decided to give it a try for real. Something about it felt right and real and unlike anything Conner had ever experienced before, something he was eager to explore. He knew Dick felt the same.  
“Between college and missions with Batman I haven’t seen you in a week. If I get any more bored I’m going to start taking it out on the newbies and amp up sparring training.” 

“I’ll see what I can do,” Dick smirked. “And give the team a break, would ya. Except for Tim. Kid jacked my tablet two weeks ago and I have yet to get it back.”

“I will avenge you,” Connor mocked. “So I’ll see you later?”

“Con...”

“I’ll see you later!”

“If you say so,” Dick sighed, unable to stop the smile on his face as he disconnected the call. 

Dick made a sharp right, deciding to cut through the alley between the Science building and the Library on his way to the parking lot on the other side. With an amused sigh, Dick decided he’d skip the Manor and would surprise Conner and attempt to do some homework at the mountain before patrol. His grades would probably suffer a bit from the distraction but at least he didn’t have to make his boyfriend suffer. He barley took notice of four figures clad in scrubs coming from the opposite direction, a quick pace about them. Dick glanced at his watch, noting it was almost 6 pm, assuming they were med students rushing to get to night classes.

Dick side stepped to move closer to the wall to let them pass through, paying them little mind as he sent a quick text to Tim telling him he was headed to the mountain and would see him tonight for patrol. Just as he hit send, he was tackled to the ground; his phone skidded from his hand and his backpack slide off his shoulder as he fell.

“Gahh-son of a-” Dick rolled on his back but before he could jump up or reach for any hidden weapons from his jacket, the four men descended on his limbs, surgical masks obscuring their faces and gloved, grabbing him roughly, yanking him up. 

One of the men wrapped an arm around his waist and grabbed a hold of his left arm while the second man used his left gloved hand to clamp over Dick’s mouth and used his other to wrench Dick’s right arm up behind his back. The third grabbed both of his ankles, lifting his feet off the ground and ridding Dick of any chance of gaining leverage.

Dick struggled and bucked in the clutch the men had on him, shouting underneath the hand silencing him. The fourth man came to stand in front of him, pulling a needle out of his jacket pocket. Dick had no control as the man wound a gloved hand in his hair and pulled, yanking is head to the side, leaving his neck stretched and exposed as he plunged a hypodermic needle into Dick’s neck. The attacker noticed the otherwise well-hidden com in Dick’s ear. He yanked it out, throwing it aside as well as the now empty needle. 

Dick groaned beneath the hand over his mouth as he felt the contents of the needle enter his bloodstream. Almost instantly the edges of his vision started to blur, his body started to tingle as his aggressors forced him face down on the ground. He tried to shout out as the hand was removed from his mouth but no sound came out. 

Dick was motionless, unable to twitch even a finger or move his lips. Whatever had been in that needle must have caused his paralysis. He was quickly stripped of all his clothes, the four men manhandling him, pushing and pulling at him as they tore and tugged off all his clothes, shoes and watch leaving him only in his boxer briefs. They were smart, Dick would give them that. Any concealed weapons would be left in the alley as clothes were thrown aside; also left behind were the locator tracker in his watch, the one sewn into his jacket, his backpack, wallet and the one in his comm.

One of the sets of hands forced his arms behind his back while another grabbed at his legs. His wrists were crossed at the small of his back, lashed together with rope before being tightly cinched. More rope was wound around his elbows, them having been painfully pulled together until they were mere inches apart before the rope was also cinched off. He couldn't even struggle as his ankles and knees were bound in the same fashion. The third thug grabbed his head and pulled it back by the hair. Dick could only moan in pain as the man forced a wad of cloth into his slack mouth. It was followed by a length of black cloth stretched between his teeth and pulled behind his head. It was wrapped around his head and between his teeth three times before being tied in a tight double knot behind his head.

The moment they had finished binding and gagging him, three of his attackers slid their arms beneath his motionless body and hoisted him off the ground, carrying him like a batting ram closer to the end of the alley where suddenly an unmarked van screeched to a halt, blocking the exit. The fourth opened the sliding door and Dick was roughly deposited into the back of the van.

He was left lying on his back, arms trapped beneath him, unable to move, unable to cry for help as he was forced to stare up at the ceiling of the van. Dick was unsure how long they had been driving, the inability to feel anything, to look around, took away his perception of time. He prayed that the drug would wear off soon or his friends would find him before the thugs acted on his vulnerability. 

‘What a mess, Grayson,' he thought o himself. 'Bruce is going to freak on you for getting snatched...if you don’t get yourself killed first.’

__________________________________________

Conner awoke suddenly to a loud thud beside his head, rising from where he had fallen asleep very late last night on the couch in the rec room.

“What the-”

“Where is he?” Tim glared at him, having just dropped a stack of textbooks on the coffee table, dressed in his civvies, shades resting on his forehead, waiting to be lowered at a moment when someone walked in who didn’t know his secret identity.

“Where’s who?” Conner growled angrily, a quick glance at his watch telling him it was 8 am, noting he had only been asleep 3 hours after he finally crashed.

“I don’t have time for this Conner, I have to get to school. I’m looking for the former boy wonder that never showed up for patrol last night. Batman was pissed,” Tim’s hands rested firmly on his hips, staring down at the twenty-three-year-old boy. “I covered for him, saying he got caught up in a team exercise here but you and I both know that’s probably not what he got caught up in.” 

“What are you talking about? Dick never showed. I must have passed out here last night, but I would have heard him Zeta in if he did,” Conner couldn’t suppress the yawn, rubbing at the back of his neck where it ached from the uncomfortable sleeping position.

“I got his text yesterday. He said he was headed here,” Tim whipped out his phone and handed it to Conner. Looking at the time stamp, Conner noticed it was right after their conversation yesterday evening.

“Have you heard from him since?” Conner couldn’t help the worry creep into his voice. He also couldn’t help but notice Tim’s body language shift, hands dropping from hips to clench into fists down at his side. 

Conner didn’t wait for an answer from Tim before activating his com. 

“Dick, do you copy?” He paused, waiting for a response. “Nightwing, do you copy?”

“Batman,” Tim activated his own com, “we have a situation. Dick is missing.”

_____________________________________

“Now Mr. Grayson, you need to calm down,” the doctor said as he came to stand by Dick’s head, “You’re only going to make this harder than it needs to be.”

“Nu-mmm-mmppphhhh!” Dick snarled, glaring up at the villain as he came over to stand by Dick’s head, twisting and pulling as much as he could restrained to the chair.

“We are going to start with simple classical conditioning. You’re a smart lad, I’m sure you’ve heard of it but just in case I’ll explain it simply to you. Classical conditioning is a learning process that occurs when two stimuli are repeatedly paired. The result is a response that is originally elicited by the second stimulus and is eventually elicited by the first stimulus alone. Understand?” his captor spoke calmly as he dipped his hands into a small tub on a tray next to the chair. With gel on his fingertips, he applied it to Dick’s temples as he spoke. “In this case, the second stimulus is Electroconvulsive Shock Therapy.”

As he spoke, the Doctor applied an electrode to each of Dick’s temples. 

“Typically we would insert a rubber block in your mouth to prevent biting of the tongue but your current gag should suffice and we don’t want to give you any opportunity to call out to your friends in high places who possess super hearing.” 

Dick tried to jerk his head to shake the electrodes off but the strap at his neck prohibited him from getting enough movement or momentum to do so. The Doctor moved over to a nearby rolling cart where the ECT machine awaited. 

“Now boy wonder, there really is no point in resisting. We are going to introduce the second stimulus first just so you can get a taste. This will hurt, but it will be over soon.” The second the Doctor hit the switch, a jolt of pain struck Dick as the electricity attacked him. His whole body instantly tensed, his back arching as he lifted himself reflexively off the chair on his heels and arms as much as the restraints would allow. 

“MMMMMMM!!!!!!!!” His head was thrown back in pain, his neck stretching beneath the strap. His eyes squeezed tightly as his fists clenched. Dick’s body convulsed helplessly as the electric currents flowed through his body. His captors stood around and watched his body writhe as he struggled against the bonds.

Beads of sweat had formed on the exposed flesh of his arms, torso, legs and on the lines of his face and he was shaking in pain. His body convulsed violently as the electricity coursed through his body. The gag muffled Dick’s pain-filled screams. He panted heavily through his nose. Silent tears rolled down his face.

When the switch was turned off and the shock finally stopped, Dick’s straining muscles ceased and his body collapsed into the chair like a limp rag doll. 

“How did that feel?” the Doctor asked.

Dick just sat there shivering in pain. All of his muscles twitched as one as he panted raggedly, whimpering as he recovered from the horrific shock. 

“You see that was a hearty sample of what you can come to expect for the next few days.” Dick managed to throw a glare at his captor’s direction as the Doctor positioned the screen attached above him to directly in front of his face. “You're going to watch a little video now for the next few hours, the first stimulus in our classical conditioning experiment. Every so often you’ll feel a jolt like the one you just experienced. If you’ll notice that they correspond to certain images on the screen, I do believe you’ll begin to see what my point of this particular session is. Think of it as a sort of intense aversion therapy treatment. Enjoy.”

With that, the Doctor left the room, just as the screen sprung to life. News clips flashed across the screen, various newsreels, interviews, and pictures of public personas, random pictures of cities. After a few minutes, Dick was beginning to grow confused until a news reel featuring Superman came onto the screen.

“MMMMNNNPPH!” Immediately the electric current kicked on and flowed through his body, causing him to scream and writhe in his restraints. It flowed for the entire length of the Superman clip and when the video switched to an interview with Lex Luthor, the flow abruptly stopped. Dick’s chest heaved, his body in agony as it tried to recover. A few minutes after more meaningless video footage, a picture of Green Arrow came up and a quick electrical pulse simultaneously with it. And then the image left and the current stopped.

It didn’t take long for Dick to understand what he meant by classical conditioning. Pain and fear associated with the Justice League. Clever. Simple. Effective.

As a short clip of an interview with Bruce Wayne flashed on the screen, Dick couldn’t help but be relieved that no electricity flowed. He clung to that small moment of hope, knowing that they weren’t aware of Bruce’s alter ego. But in an instant, any feelings of relief were jolted away as an image of Martian Manhunter flashed on the screen and the current returned.

The screen went black and the electricity stopped momentarily. And then security footage of Batman appeared and Dick was sure it was his imagination but the electrical current felt stronger this time. It coursed through his body, causing Dick to shake violently and thrash in his restraints, screaming in agony, biting down hard on the foam in his mouth as his eyes rolled back into his head. And then just like that, it ended and he sunk into the chair, panting and sobbing.

Dick lost track and focus of what he was watching, only being made aware when a member of the Justice League was on screen and the excruciating pain that went with it, covered in a cold sweat, his body residually twitching every so often until fell happily into unconsciousness.


	3. I'm afraid to sleep because of what haunts me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> And I’m afraid  
> To sleep because of what haunts me  
> Such as living with the uncertainty  
> That I’ll never find the words to say  
> Which could completely explain  
> Just how I’m breaking down

“I appreciate you all meeting me here,” Bruce spoke to the small crowd gathered in the large living room of Wayne Manor. He stood by the large fireplace, evening light flooding the room through the expansive floor to ceiling windows. He looked to Barry Allen who stood behind the black leather couch to Bruce’s right, his arms crossed over his chest. Conner Kent was seated in front of him on the couch, one hand clenched into a fist resting on his knee, the other raised to his forehead where his fingers seemed to try to massage his temple quite forcibly. Wally West sat on the other end of the couch, one foot propped up on the cushion, knee drawn to his chest, his head resting atop folded arms over his knee. 

“We’re here to help, Bruce,” Clark Kent spoke from the chair to Bruce’s left. He too glanced around the room at all the heroes gathered. However, today they were in their civvies, not assembled as world protectors but as concerned friends and family of the missing Dick Grayson.

Tim Drake sat on one of the black club chairs, legs folded crisscrossed on the cushion beneath him, elbows resting on his knees, head in his hands. Alfred stood beside the chair, one arm folded behind his back, the other rested a comforting hand on Tim’s shoulder, providing quiet support for the teenager. 

“We searched up and down the campus, the parking lot, the nearby area,” Wally sighed, defeat lacing his voice. “We found no prints, no fibers, no hairs, not even shoes with discernible sole prints. All trackers in Dick’s clothes, watch, comm and backpack were left behind which means we have no way of knowing where the hell he was taken to once they left campus. And there was no evidence of anyone being in that alley other than Dick.”

“And the hypodermic needle left behind had traces of a neurotoxin that causes muscular paralysis,” Tim added, also not able to hide the defeat in his voice. “All we were able to get from that was that its generic needle from a company that supplies to the Northern East Coast including Metropolis, Bludhaven, Gotham and everything in between.”

“Dick’s been missing for 72 hours now, we need more than that,” as Barry spoke up he spared a glance to his protégé and nephew, Wally. Dick and Wally had been best friends for years and Barry knew this was eating him up, just like it was everyone else in the room.

“Master Dick was taken off campus as civilian Dick Grayson. We’ve informed the authorities but we do believe this has less to do with his identity as Dick Grayson and more to do with his, shall we say, nightlife,” Alfred supplied, his stone face and steady voice refusing to betray the anger and sadness boiling inside the older man.

“You think Dick was taken out of costume because someone figured out he’s Nightwing?” Clark looked to Bruce. The implications that someone knew Dick’s identity meant it could only be a matter of time before they discovered Tim’s, Bruce’s or any of them for that matter.

“Bruce Wayne hasn’t received any communications, no ransom demands, or any acknowledgment that his adopted son has been taken. But then again, neither has Batman,” Bruce rubbed at the back of his neck as he spoke, finding it difficult to keep his worry at bay. With the cowl, he could almost always suppress his emotions; without it, he was finding it nearly impossible at this moment. “If they’re not looking for money or an exchange of any kind, his abduction leads us to three possible conclusions. The least likely is that Dick was merely wrong place, wrong time. Which leaves either someone enacting on a personal vendetta against Dick or, as Alfred suggested, we have to assume someone discovered his identity and is looking to use or punish Nightwing.”

“Does it matter?” All heads turned to Conner who finally spoke.

“It does matter, Kon,” Clark leaned forward on his thighs, hands clasped between his knees as he looked at the young man. “If we figure out the ‘why’, it helps us figure out the ‘who’, and more importantly the ‘where’.”

“All that matters is that we find him,” Conner made no effort to stop the rage in his tone. “Dick is missing and we’re wasting time sitting here talking about him being missing!”

“I understand your frustration, Conner,” Bruce spoke steadily, “but I need you to keep your head straight so we can handle this rationally.”

Conner didn’t respond with anything other than a glare, pushing himself off the couch and leaving the room. Clark sighed, leaning back in his chair as the young man left.

“He’s not wrong,” Wally broke the heavy silence in the room that had hung with Conner’s departure. “It’s been three days and we’re no closer to finding Dick.”

“I’m going to go to the Watchtower to speak with J’onn and M’gann. Maybe they can pick up something, some trace of the kid,” Barry patted Wally on the back before zooming out of the manor. 

“I think I’m going to head back to the school,” Tim stood from the chair. “We’ve seen the security footage from the alley but If I can get into the security office I can look through the cameras and try to get some sort of visual of campus that day, before, during and after his abduction. See if there’s something.” 

“I’ll go with you,” Wally followed Tim out of the living room at Bruce’s nod of approval.

Bruce watched as Alfred sighed and hurried to leave the room to busy himself with some meaningless task. Bruce knew Alfred was having just as hard a time as he was with Dick’s disappearance, if not more. It wasn’t easy for Alfred, watching his family go out there every night, missing days at a time, waiting and praying for their safe return when they were on duty. But when it was one of them out of uniform taken, Alfred couldn't escape the grief or anxiety. Despite the lack of blood relation, Bruce and Dick were his family, his children and Alfred couldn’t bear the thought of losing them. Unlike Bruce and Dick, Alfred hadn’t been crippled by grief at a young age; but he did help both of them pick up the pieces of their life after they had. Bruce wished there was something he could do to reassure Alfred that Dick would come back safe, but at this point, Bruce was in need of it himself. 

“Bruce, I’m going to go talk to Conner,” Clark moved to stand beside his friend. 

“No,” Bruce shook his head, pinching the bridge of his nose, before turning to face Clark. “I’ll talk to him. I need you to take the needle to Star Labs as Superman, see if their more sophisticated equipment can further break down the sample of the toxin, something unique or distinguishable. Maybe there was something I missed.” Bruce pulled a small, narrow sealed container that housed the needle with what little trace it had left in its vial. 

“You don’t miss much, Bruce. You really think it’ll help? ” Clark asked, eyeing his friend up and down.

“Honestly? No,” Bruce sighed. “But I’m running out of ideas and Dick could be running out of time.”

Clark nodded, accepting the package with one hand and squeezed Bruce’s shoulder once with the other before leaving him alone. Bruce took a look around the now empty room. He was so angry, wanting nothing more than to trash the furniture in some satisfying fit of rage. But it would serve no purpose and would do little to satisfy his anger and helplessness. Instead, he set off to search the manor for the other man he knew was filled with a helpless rage.

_____________________

Twenty minutes later found Bruce crossing Dick’s bedroom and heading towards the balcony leading off the room. He’d searched the fitness center, the kitchen, and a couple other rooms in the manor before he was compelled to Dick’s room. He could see Conner on the other side of the windowed doors leading to the small balcony. Dick had revealed his identity to some of his team shortly before he transitioned from Robin to Nightwing and over the last few years since Conner had been to Wayne Manor quite a few times. Although in the last year it had been much more frequently. As he crossed the room, Bruce recalled one particular time about six months ago where he walked in on Conner and Dick making out on the couch in Dick’s room. Conner had turned as red as the insignia on his shirt, scrambling to get out from beneath Dick who had been straddled on his lap. Bruce remembered clearly that Dick had merely just smirked and sighed at Bruce, simply impatient and slightly annoyed that the man had interrupted him; try as he might Bruce couldn’t embarrass the boy. 

It wasn’t the first time Bruce had caught Dick in some room of the manor with a love interest, male or female; although it had been the first time he’d actually caught him with a teammate. Dick knew how Bruce felt about dating within the team and although Bruce knew Dick had pretty much casually dated about half of the young justice league, Dick had been smart enough to not do it under Bruce’s disapproving nose. Dick had a reputation of being a ‘dog’. He was charming, flirty, and someone that craved interpersonal connection. It wasn’t that Dick Grayson was a player, he just loved so freely and cared so deeply about people that it was easy for him to fall in and out love. But the fact that Dick and Conner had been romantically involved for at least six months now, much longer than any of Dick’s usual trysts, Bruce was willing to overlook the fact that they worked together. 

Dick was so the opposite of Bruce in many ways that one would never think he’d been raised by the billionaire since he was nine years old. He sometimes wished Dick wouldn’t fall so easily for other people, that he’d sometimes save a little part of his heart for himself. But that trait, that strength in faith and trust in heart, was so uniquely Dick that Bruce wouldn’t trade it for anything. His son had always placed his trust and faith in his friends, always led with his heart. Bruce suspected that was part of the reason he was still friends with every single one of his ex’s, that it was part of the reason why every member of the league trusted Nightwing. He didn’t blame anyone for just being completely drawn to Dick, even to the point of risking the wrath of the Batman by making out with his son in the Batman’s home. 

Bruce smiled sadly at the memory as he crossed the room and went out to the balcony. Conner was hunched over, hands spread out, gripping the balcony railing that came no higher than his waist. If Conner heard him approach, he didn’t acknowledge Bruce’s presence as he came to stand beside him. The two stood in silence for a while before Conner spoke.

“I can’t hear him,” was all Conner said, gazing intensely at the Gotham horizon. Bruce didn’t say anything in return, just turned to look at the young man. “I know his voice, I know his heartbeat, but I can’t find it amongst all the noise out there. I keep listening for him but I can’t hear anything.” 

“He may not be close, Conner,” Bruce sighed, crossing his arms over his chest. “Or he may not be able to speak.”  
“Clark taught me to hone my super hearing, to listen for certain buzz words like ‘help’ or ‘bomb’ or whatever,” Conner pushed away from the railing and straightened up, turning to Bruce. “If I just keep an ear out…I don’t know.”  
“It’s something,” Bruce nodded his approval at Conner, sensing the boy needed it in that moment. The moment passed though as Conner’s hands tightened into fists and the infamous anger that often plagued the young man, though not nearly as frequently anymore, took over.

“It’s not enough,” Conner slammed a fist into the railing, cracking the marble. “We’re supposed to be superheroes, you’re supposed to be the World’s Greatest Detective! How is it possible we can’t find one of our own?”

“Conner, I need you to keep your head clear and not let your personal relationship with Dick cloud your emotions,” Bruce spoke steadily.

“Don’t you dare tell me how I’m supposed to feel,” Conner growled at the older man, fury in his eyes. “As for our relationship, it’s none of your damned busi-“

“It absolutely is my business,” Bruce interrupted, voice loud now, grabbing Conner by the shoulders. “Anything that has to do with that boy, with Dick, is my business. I’ve seen his heartbreak, his body break, had his blood on my hands, had my blood transfused into his veins. I’ve broken his heart, broken his bones, put him back together and am responsible for a few of those scars on his body. He is my family, my son. I know how careful and protective he is with every single person he cares about, and how reckless he is with his own well-being. So, yes I will tell you how you’re supposed to feel because I know that you’re angry. So am I! No one wants him back more than I do!” 

All the anger suddenly drained from Bruce’s body with the last sentence. He let go of his hold on Conner’s shoulders. The anger had faded from Conner as well, who was no longer looking like the angered young man from moments ago, but the lost one Bruce had come across when he first stepped onto the balcony. Bruce sunk onto a nearby bench, exhausted.

“For what its worth, Conner, I’m not angered by your relationship with Dick. I’m completely fine with the two of you being in a relationship, despite the fact that you’re teammates. As long as you do it right, for yourself and for him. He’s been through enough; so have you. What I do care about is you keeping your head during this. You’re his team member first; do you think you can remember that?”

“Yes, sir,” Conner nodded. Bruce waited for him to continue, sensing the younger man had more to say. “Did you ever listen to ‘Blue’?”

Bruce was taken back, surprised by the random question and not sure what Conner was talking about or where this was going. He thought a moment and then it dawned on him.

“I didn’t peg you as a Joni Mitchell fan, Kent.” Conner chuckled at the caped crusader's confusion. He was aware how crazy he probably sounded in that moment.

“I’m not. Well, I wasn’t” Con smiled but with a hint of sadness. “I don’t know much about music. It wasn’t exactly Cadmus priority and I just never gave it any thought. But Dick, Dick can’t get enough of it, as I’m sure you know.”

“Oh, yes. I had to remind him that having the radio playing while patrolling in the Batmobile was counterproductive on more than one occasion. Didn’t stop him from trying to install Satellite radio in the Batmobile though.”

“The guy has a playlist for everything. Training, studying, meditating, you name it. And he just couldn’t wrap his head around me just not being into music,” Conner spoke, leaning back against the balcony railing, facing Bruce with his arms crossed over his chest. “So early on as a team after missions, I would find these flash drives in my quarters with a playlist on it that he had made and insisted on me listening to. Rock, mostly. He figured I’d be into it based on my ‘raging out’ as he called it. Then the day after he found out that M’gann and I broke up, he invited me over to the Manor to just hang out. We’re sitting in his room on the floor, just talking and chilling and he asks me about the breakup, about how I feel about not being with the person I love anymore. All I said to him was that I didn’t really think I knew love at all. His eyes lit up when I said that and he tells me that’s a line in a song. So he runs to the other side of his room and he pulls out a vinyl record. I’d never seen one before and didn’t see the big deal but he told me it belonged to his mother. He said he didn’t have much from his parents because they didn't have much. But this he kept.”

Conner moved to sit beside Bruce on the bench who was just staring at the younger man as he spoke, listening to Conner tell him a story about his adopted son. 

“This was his mother’s favorite. He said his mother used to play music as she was getting ready before they would go perform and the album ‘Blue’ she would play the most. He tells me what I just said is in a song ‘Both Sides Now’ on this album and then just starts telling me about Joni Mitchell and his mother and this album; that there was a song on the album that Dick was convinced why his parents named him Richard,” Conner paused the story to smile to himself before looking at Bruce. “I could have sat there for hours just listening to him talk about it. And you know how he gets, he can talk for hours.”

“All too well,” Bruce chuckled.

“So he’s talking and then it gets to ‘A Case of You’ and he stops mid-sentence,” Conner continued. “He lifts his finger to his mouth to silence me, even though he was the one talking. He closes his eyes, and starts mouthing every word, silently singing, with a sad kind of smile on his face.” Conner closed his eyes, remembering that night vividly. “I’d never seen that side of Dick before. It’s one of my most favorite moments with him. We weren’t even seeing each other then. We didn’t start seeing each other for almost a year after that but I’ve never looked at him the same way since then. I know every lyric from that album now.”

“So what then Conner,” Bruce asked, not harshly, just curious as to why Conner was choosing to share this particular memory with him.

“You’re right. He’s not just a member of my team, Bruce,” Conner spoke; his demeanor dropping from the lighthearted story to the most serious Bruce had ever seen him. “He’s in my blood like holy wine. I need him back.” 

“We’ll get him back, Conner.”

_____________________

Dick couldn’t stop the tremors that randomly racked his body. His jaw ached, his limbs were sore, and his head throbbed. He wasn’t sure how many electro treatments he’d endured; fading in and out of consciousness between treatments was messing with his timeline, messing with his memory and perception. 

He didn’t know how long he’d been captive. It had definitely been days, maybe longer. When he wasn’t undergoing treatments he was sedated. They weren’t feeding him; all his necessary nutrients were coming from an IV drip, providing him just enough of the essentials so that Dick’s body wouldn’t shut down. They hadn’t even untied him once. Dick suspected it was because he was nice and secure and they weren’t going to risk giving him an opportunity to let him get the drop on them by trying to move him.

Dick slowly turned his head, revealing that he was not alone in the room; one of the Doctor’s orderlies hovered over him. He hadn’t had a moment to process before his captor descended on him swiftly, clasping one surgical gloved hand over his restrained throat, the other pinching his nostrils. Panicked, Dick pushed his head back against the chair, letting out a strangled scream behind the gag, his eyes widening in fear as his air was cut off. Dick yanked at the restraints, desperate to shove the attacker away. There'd been no time to inhale. Dick’s head pressed harder into the headrest, body arching upwards.

Then his captor removed his hand, and Dick deeply inhaled those first crucial breaths through flaring nostrils. With his mouth still gagged tightly, all he could draw breath though was his nose, his chest, and abdomen heaving desperately.  
He sensed it coming--by intuition or from the experience of his very recent lesson. The man shifted slightly, a quarter-turn toward him. Dick sneaked in a breath this time, the hands clamping down on his face, strong. A groan emanated from his throat, trailed by soft muffled grunts within his sinuses as the membranes made contact with one another, craving for sustenance.

Dick’s fisted grip weakened; his eyes blinked rapidly. His captor held on until Dick’s vision began to darken. Suddenly he was released. Dick gasped, his initial breath violently desperate as panted quickly.

“You don’t know me Bird Boy. But back in the day when you still wearing a cape, you and Daddy-Bats put my brother in jail on some two-bit heist he pulled with the Penguin.” The man was just inches from Dick’s face, his hand tightening over the neck restraint. Dick could feel his hot breath that reeked of tobacco even through the surgical mask he wore to cover his face as he hovered over Dick’s. “He died in that cell two years ago. He got shanked by some asshole that you and the bat probably threw in jail too. I loved my brother. And now I’m gonna make it so that you thank me for every breath you get, Bird boy.” 

He felt the movement towards him, and the strong hand clamped over his gagged mouth and nose, halting Dick’s head movement and cutting off his air supply. Dick moaned desperately under the smothering hand. He felt his head spin and could hear his own heartbeat rushing into his ears. He fought to twist his head free but succeeded only in exhausting the oxygen in his system. Dick grunted and his eyes rolled back, head spinning from lack of oxygen as his the edges of his vision began to close in.

“Enough!” a mechanical voice bellowed from the entrance to the room and the hands were quickly removed from his throat and face. Dick gasped beneath the gag and tried to pull in as much air as he could through his nose. He inhaled deeply, panting through ragged breaths as the orderly moved out of the way and the Doctor rushed to hover over him, eyes still covered by the mirrored glasses and face still covered by the surgical mask. He checked Dick’s pulse, finding it to be rapid and fair and the Doctor took Dick’s face between his hands and checked his pupils as Dick’s breath’s evened and slowed.

“What in the hell were you thinking?” the Doctor let go of Dick’s face to turn and shout at the hired orderly. 

“Look, Doc, I wasn’t going to kill him,” the thug raised his hand’s up in the air signifying surrender. “I just wanted to have a little fun with the punk.” 

“You will have your chance to have your fun,” the Doctor reprimanded. “Now is not that time. Now go prepare phase two and I do not want to catch you alone with the patient again or I will reconsider your pay-grade.”

“Yes sir,” the orderly grumbled and left the room.

The Doctor sighed and turned back towards Dick who was finally recovered from almost suffocating. Dick tried to flex the kinks in his jaw but the gag still held steady and provided him little opportunity for relief. 

“I’m terribly sorry about that, Richard,” As the Doctor spoke he moved away briefly to adjust the IV drip inserted in Dick’s arm. “What is the old cliche, hired criminals who don’t have a personal vendetta against the Bat are so hard to find these days?”

Dick couldn’t suppress the chill that ran down his spine as the Doctor laughed at his own joke. The Doctor pulled at the extended arm above and positioned the video screen into Dick’s line of sight but Dick was confused because he was not hooked up with any of the electroshock apparatus. 

The screen sprang to life and started with an interview of a Diplomat from Bialya and Dick was certain now there was a drug also in the IV bag that was relaxing his muscles and keeping him docile because for whatever reason he continued to watch the video footage time and time again, each time with each treatment a new video reel. 

Suddenly the interview ended and news footage sprang to life with The Flash and Dick’s body tensed, his heart raced, his breathing hitched, and he couldn’t suppress a scream at the sight of the hero.

It was as if his body had been shocked, but no current ran through him. As the screen changed to a news report about politics, Dick panted as his body recovered, his muscles twitching, cursing himself at the involuntary response. 

“Well, well, well,” the Doctor sneered, moving into Dick’s line of sight, shining a flashlight into Dick’s eyes, pleased with Dick’s pupils dilated in fear. “That is most certainly the desired response. You’re progressing quite well, Mr. Grayson. I want to observe one more thing and then I think we can move on to the next stage in your treatment.” 

The Doctor grabbed Dick’s chin in his hand and forced him to look at the screen as an image of Batman came onto the screen.

“MMMMM!!!” Dick screamed, squeezing his eyes shut, his bindings keeping him well restrained as he fought them, trying to get away from the fear and the pain he felt as Batman’s image stared back at him from the screen.


	4. Someone come and save my life

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone come and, someone come and save my life  
> Maybe I’ll sleep when I am dead  
> But now it’s like night is taking sides   
> With all the worries that occupy the back of mind  
> Could it be this misery will suffice?

“Wake up!” 

Dick was jolted awake with a shake as a female voice shouted. As his vision came into focus, standing above him was Wally and Artemis, both in full uniform. Kid Flash was quickly unbinding Dick’s limbs from the restraints while Artemis gently unfastened the strap from around his mouth.

“Thank god, Dick,” Artemis sighed as she reached two fingers in to help Dick dislodge the foam block that had filled the inside of his mouth for days and threw the offending item to the floor.“We were afraid we were too late.” 

“I-“ Dick coughed, trying to loosen up his vocal chords that hadn’t been used in days, “I knew you guys would find me.”

“Yeah well we gotta get you outta here quick,” Wally spoke, frantic as he and Artemis each took one of Dick’s arms under their shoulders, each wrapping an arm behind his back to steady their friend as they hoisted him out of the chair.

“Where are-“

“Kaldur, Meghan and Conner are all outside trying to make a path for us to escape,” Artemis answered before Dick could finish the question. They kept their grasps tight on Dick as they ushered him out of the room he’d been stuck in for god knows how long. As they opened the door and tried to escape through the hall they were ambushed by a dozen of the Doctor’s orderlies, the three separating as to fight back. 

Dick was kneed in the gut and the young man doubled over in pain. He was still weak from the abuse and as Dick went to swing up at his attacker, a fist connected with his own mouth, splitting his lip, and forcing him to the ground. As Dick’s face slammed down on the linoleum floor what he saw chilled his blood.

There lying on the floor down the hall was M’gann, her eyes open and unseeing, mouth slack. 

'No.'

Dick pushed himself up off the ground, his eyes searching the room as he saw Wally collapse in a heap after one of their attackers snapped his neck. 

'No!'

A fist in his hair yanked his head back, pulling Dick to his knees as he was forced to watch Artemis shot in the chest and Kaldur strangled in a chokehold. 

'No, god no!'

“I told you there was no point in fighting,” the familiar voice of the Doctor spoke as he rounded the corner and walked towards where Dick was frozen in despair at his friends' death, no longer even feeling the pain from the vice grip at his head.

Behind him two of his orderlies walked, dragging a limp body between them. Before they tossed the lifeless body to the ground, Dick already knew it was Conner. A bright green blade stuck out from his back, buried deep right into the spine.

“These are your worst fears realized, Richard,” the Doctor bent over him, his voice calm and collected as he smiled down at the heartbroken boy. 

“No, no, no,” Dick’s silent cries were nothing but a faint moan as the world turned upside down on him. 

The images of his fallen teammates disappeared, the images burned in his mind though, as he awoke from the haze. All he saw now was black.

He felt hands on his head pull off whatever was covering his eyes and he blinked as his vision came into focus. 

He was still in the damned room, trapped to the chair, still gagged, still immobile. 

He panted heavily beneath an oxygen mask that rest over his nose and gagged lips, tears streaming from his eyes as he still felt the agony of watching his friends be killed. His whole body ached, his head where his hair had been pulled, his gut and jaw where he had been punched. 

“That's right, breathe it in deep, Richard. This combination of oxygen and ether is allowing you to breathe deeply through your treatments but is keeping you nice and docile,” the Doctor encouraged as Dick could feel him lift something off his forehead. “That was a fascinating response. Whatever you saw, your body responded as if it was really happening. Your vital signs went haywire, your body reacted as if in natural pain, and your anguish was palpable.”

Dick glared up at him through heavy eyes, trying to make sense of what his captor was saying. 

“I do think the addition of the Benzodiazepine into your IV drip definitely enhanced the hallucination this time around.”

Dick’s eyes widened, his breath shortened, relief washing over him as the realization that what he just experienced was some sort of dream, a hallucination or something; that his friends hadn’t tried to free him, and they hadn’t died in doing so. 

“This is the first time you’ve come out of this phase in the treatment believing whatever it was you just saw.” At Dick’s confused look, the Doctor continued. “You don't remember, do you? Good, then let me have the pleasure of explaining it to you again.”

He grabbed two items from the nearby table. 

“These when switched on,” he said, holding up a pair of goggles, “display hypnotic colors while this,” he held up a metal headband with an array of wires that connected to a nearby computer and power box, “send messages to your brain. Together these two work in tandem and the program stimulates the fear centers of your brain, giving rise to your fears and nightmares. With the addition of the Benzo and your sedation, the results are very satisfying. Dr. Crane isn’t the only doctor in Gotham who can experiment with fear, Richard.”

“Rimmmph nnngg,” Dick swore behind the gag, his still-groggy brow furring in anger, his eyes filling with fire as he stared up at his captor. He was exhausted, drained, battered, but he was not beaten. He would not be a willing participant in this sick twist’s games. His tried to clench his fists to pull at the wrist bindings, but his strength was weakened as a result of the tainted air being forced into his system through the mask.

“What do you say we have another go around, shall we?” The Doctor didn’t even entertain waiting for a response from Dick as the goggles were placed back over Dick’s eyes.

His vision was black as he felt the headband replaced onto his forehead. Panic began to overtake Dick as he waited in darkness, knowing that fear and heartache were in store for him once the Doctor turned on the machine. The panic circled him like a beast stalking prey. The hero had been in countless predicaments that left him vulnerable before but never anything quite like this. He’d faced his fears long ago, but as the Doctor had told him on day one, they were trying to break him. And for the first time in a long time, Dick felt like he was at his breaking point.

With a dull hum, he heard the machine spring to life and the goggles came alive as colors danced into his vision and he succumbed to the hallucinations.

For days he watched his friends dying again trying to save him. He relived his parents' death. He was there the night Jason Todd was killed by the Joker. He watched Bruce falling to his death just like his parents, and yet another failed rescue attempt resulting in his friends' deaths. And then the past treatment of the electroshock therapy was actualized when Dick dreamed of the Justice League going rogue and destroying humanity. 

Some repeated more than others; his team dying in an attempt to save him was the one that seemed to replay itself the most. They died differently each time, always in an attempt to rescue him. Sometimes it was the original team, sometimes Tim and the new recruits were there too. But it always ended the same. They were always trying to rescue him, Conner was always the last to die, and Dick was always left behind alive and broken. And Dick could honestly say, he wasn't sure if they were really alive anymore. 

Each time he awoke from the hallucinations half-conscious, his muscles wracked with strain against the bindings, body throbbing, head, and heart pounding, and feeling a little less whole then the time before. Each time, a little less sure of which reality he was truly existing in. 

Despite it, Dick held on to two truths he knew to be infallible with unwavering certainty. The first was his identity. He had held a lot of titles in his twenty years. A Flying Grayson, son, and acrobat; Robin, sidekick and boy wonder. And more recently, Nightwing, Batman’s dark heir, a teen titan. But through it all, he had always been Dick, clinging to that strip of light in his world surrounded by darkness, and he always would fight till his dying breath to continue to help those in need, to be a catalyst of change and light in a dark world. 

The second truth he didn’t learn till after a few years after his parents died. Something that had nothing to do with having Batman as a mentor and partner, or being a valuable asset to the fight for justice. It was something that he just knew that would always be, despite their differences, their battles, and their different journeys. Dick knew with unshakable faith that no matter what the cost, no matter where, Bruce would always find him when he needed finding, whether spiritually, emotionally, or physically. That thicker than blood, Bruce Wayne, not Batman but Bruce, would always protect Dick Grayson. He’d rescued him that night his world shattered, rescued him by allowing him to join him in his crusade, and countless times after. He was his safety net. Bruce would always save him.

Dick teetered on the edge of consciousness as the Doctor and orderlies cleared the room after his final treatment for the day, however many days it had been. Two thoughts crossed his mind as he was left alone to finally rest. The first was how was he supposed to cling to his identity when he was having a hard time clinging to reality, the unshakable dread that swept over him that his friends had been killed trying to save him, that he couldn't trust anyone anymore? The second thought that was his final one before he succumbed to much-anticipated unconsciousness was the hope that it wouldn't take Bruce, the one man he knew he could trust, too much longer to save him this time. 

 

__________________________

 

Eight days. It didn’t sound like much when you framed time like that. Now 192 hours, that was more expressive of just how long it been.

Bruce glanced down at his watch, noting that it was now 11 pm, making it 197 hours since Dick Grayson was abducted. He sighed, leaning back in the chair, staring at the large computer screen in front of him as he sat at the console in the Batcave. Occupying the screen was all the information they had gathered, and to Bruce’s frustration, rage, and disappointment, it wasn't much. 

The security camera footage from campus only showed Dick being grabbed and manhandled before the footage cut out. All campus cameras went out at the exact same time. Campus security chalked it up to a server glitch but Bruce knew better. With the whole security system down and no visual on whatever vehicle had taken Dick away, there was no way to track it on traffic cameras. And there was no visual of the four thugs that had attacked Dick either prior to them cutting through the parking lot to intercept Dick in the alley. 

Bruce had watched and re-watched the footage countless times in the last two hours. The clip was a mere two minutes and thirty-five seconds but Bruce was looking for anything distinguishable about the men who had grabbed his son. But these men had worn basic scrubs, nondescript windbreakers, gloved and masked, and worked smart, methodical. It was pissing Bruce off.

He pushed himself away from the console, getting up to stretch his muscles as he made his way over to the small tray on the other side of the cave that Alfred had left over an hour ago with some sandwiches. He had all but begged Bruce to eat, to step away for a moment and take care of himself. He had been alone in the cave for over twelve hours now, still dressed in a pair of sweatpants and long sleeve henley shirt. Bruce had gotten up this morning and came straight to the cave at 7 am and hadn’t left, determined and desperate for a new lead in old information. Batgirl and Robin were sent to patrol tonight and were to call Batman if they needed him. 

Grabbing a half of turkey with swiss, Bruce eyed the chicken and jalapeño, Dick’s favorite, and grabbed a half of that as well before sauntering back to the large chair. As he settled back in he replayed the video, watching as the grainy black and white footage showed Dick being rushed by four men, grabbed and gagged and drugged, stripped and bound before the footage cut out. Bruce rewound and zoomed in. 

It was then Bruce saw it. Bruce paused the video just as Dick was caught between the three men, arms wrapped around him and twisting his own behind his back, mid-struggle as his feet were grabbed and hoisted off the ground. Bruce zoomed in to the wrist of the hand that clamped over Dick’s mouth. Peeking out between the end of a glove and cuff of the jacket was the corners of a tattoo that resembled the mark of the Bat Killers gang founded by Penguin. It wasn't much but it was a starting point, his first real lead, cross-referencing known members of the gang and ties to the medical field based on their attire. 

“Master Bruce,” Alfred called as he headed down the long staircase towards leading to the depths of the cave. and turned to face Alfred. “Young Master Kent is upstairs. Would you like-” 

Alfred stilled mid-sentence at the bottom of the stairs, staring at the paused video footage that had been zoomed in to Dick’s face, the hand clamped over Dick’s mouth. 

“Alfred,” Bruce stood and came to stand in front of his butler, a man he viewed as a father, one hand reaching to clasp Alfred’s arm. Alfred was a rock at all times, it was rare that Bruce saw the facade shatter and to see fear in Alfred’s eyes. 

“The last conversation I had with Richard was about his carelessness with his things. With all we deal with, you'd think we’d be better at having meaningful conversations. When’s the last time you told Dick how important he was to you?” Alfred spoke with a voice that was sad and angry at the same time, eyes fixated on the image of Dick on the screen. “I mean, honestly, sir, we all know what this family means to us, but we’re all so stubborn that it takes one of us laying on their death bed or at the brink of self-destructing to express it. And sometimes not even then.” 

Bruce just stared at Alfred as the other man just continued to focus on the screen over Bruce’s shoulder. Seeing the boy like that, and to Alfred, he would always be a boy, broke his heart. The hand covering his mouth, silencing that beautiful boy, the fear and anger he could see in Dick’s eyes, tore at Alfred’s soul.

“Against all odds, despite all our pain and loss, somehow we have found each other and filled that sense of family we were apparently all needing,” Alfred continued, sight unwavering from the screen. “You’ve all lost so much, had so much taken from you. Don’t let them take him from us, Master Bruce. I don’t think this family can survive it.”

“We all know what we mean to each other. But you’re right, every once in a while it wouldn’t kill us to express it,” Bruce looked to his old friend, pained at his grief. “I will bring him home Alfred.”

“You saved him once, Master Bruce, when you brought him to us all those years ago,” Alfred finally tore his gaze away from the screen showing a boy he loved to the one that was standing in front of him, grabbing tightly to Bruce’s arms. “You’ll save him again.”

“The truth is Alfred, he’s the one that saved me. I wouldn't still be here if he hadn't come into our lives. Batman would still be fighting, but Bruce would be gone. He kept me human. He reminded me every day that we were there to protect, not just punish.”

“We haven’t gotten many things right, son. But we did manage to raise a good man, despite your corruptive best efforts,” Alfred smiled sadly before he dropped his hands from Bruce’s arms, the fear Bruce had found in his eyes transforming to something more fierce, something more angry “You will find Master Dick. You always do. You always will. You must.”

Bruce didn’t say anything in response, simply just patted Alfred’s arm and nodded curtly. 

“Shall I fetch Master Conner?” Alfred straightened up where he stood, arms behind his back; and just like that, business as usual.

“No,” Bruce sighed. “I have my first real lead. And I need to get out of this cave. Maybe grab some water after choking down those stale sandwiches.”

“Well if you had eaten them when I had brought them down,” Alfred scoffed, trailing behind the smirking billionaire up the cave stairs, “they wouldn't have been as hard as your thick skull, Sir.”

 

____________________________ 

 

"The Doc wants it done while he’s unconscious." 

"But I thought we didn't want to risk moving him."

"The kid is out cold and the Doc wants him moved to the basement for treatment phase three. Let's just do it now so we don't miss the rest of the Metropolis Meteors vs Gotham Knights game."

Floating on the edge of consciousness, fuzzily aware of his surroundings and predicament, two voices pierced through his daze. Exhausted and broken as he was though, Dick fought hard to follow those vague, dull sensations back to the waking world. He could feel the absence of the straps at his chest, elbows, and wrists. The one at his neck, waist, and legs were still there but now was his chance. 

Struggling to stay absolutely still as he summoned the strength to do something, Dick felt the flare of fear and anger pulse through him as his arms were brought in front of him and his wrists were bound together with a leather strap. He had to wait for the right moment. 

As the neck strap was released, Dick’s eyes flew open and with a surge of burning rage, the orderly who released his neck was met with a vicious double-fisted punch across his jaw. Considering Dick’s drained and weary state, it was a strong swing. The orderly staggered back and with his moment of relative freedom, Dick raised bound hands to pull down the strap gagging his mouth. He spat out the completely sodden sponge and screamed.

“Superboy! Superboy, help! Con-mmmpphh!!

Dick tried to bring his limbs to block the assault but the orderlies pounced on him, seizing his bound wrists in an iron grip and a large hand clamped over Dick’s mouth, forcing Dick’s head back into the padded chair, the weight of the two men pinning him firmly back in place.

“Mmmmph!!!” Dick shouted from behind the hand, trying to bring his bound hands up to pry at the oppressive hand but the second orderly held them tightly in his grasp and Dick could feel the bones cracking in his right arm as the grip tightened and twisted. 

“Little shit,” one of the orderlies cursed, taking the hand that wasn’t covering Dick’s mouth and reached for the walkie at his belt. “Doc, we’ve got a problem. The little fucker got loose and called for one of his super friends.”  
“Idiots!” The Doctors voice shouted through the walkie.

“Do you want us to kill him?”

“No, then this would be all for naught,” the Doctor cursed. “Bring him to the basement and prep him like you would for treatment phase three and then put into effect escape plan b as we discussed. And boys, I promised you would have your chance at some fun. You have my permission to rough him up before I meet you down there.” 

The radio cut out and Dick twisted frantically in the grip his captors had on him, waist and legs still binding him to the chair giving him no chance of getting any leverage against them. Over the surgical mask, the thug with his hand clamped over Dick’s mouth, the one who had attempted to smother Dick earlier, looked down at him and Dick could tell he was smiling beneath the mask. His gloved hand pressed tighter over Dick’s mouth, the flesh beneath his hand whitening before bringing the walkie back to his face to respond.

“With pleasure.” 

 

_____________________________

 

Bruce had barely made it halfway up the staircase before Conner came running down, almost colliding with him.

“Whoa, Conner what-”

“I heard him!” Conner interrupted, frantic.

“What?! What did he say?”

“I heard him shout ‘Superboy’ and ‘help’ and then he started to say my name and then his voice went muffled. But I have him, I can hear him breathing and grunting. He’s gagged or in pain, I don’t know, but I have him! I just need to stay focused and we can find him.” 

“Stay focused. Get the Batmobile started while I suit up.” 

Bruce ran back down the stairs into the cave where Alfred was waiting already with the suit in hand, Conner right behind him making a beeline for the Batmobile.


	5. Madness fills my heart and soul

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I've become the simple souvenir of someone's kill,  
> And like the sea, I’m constantly changing from calm to ill,  
> Madness fills my heart and soul,  
> As if the great divide could swallow me whole,  
> Oh, how I’m breaking down.

Rope bound his wrists together behind the back of the wooden chair. His ankles and just below his knees were held to the corresponding legs of the chair by more rope. Another strand was stretched over his upper chest, pinning his arms to the sides, and then stretched over his abdomen, lashing him straight back against the chair.

He had been gagged with two wads of cloth stuffed inside his mouth before one of his abductors had taken a piece of rope and pulled it between Dick’s teeth and around his head three times before tying it tightly at the base of his skull in a double knot. The rope bit into the exposed skin of his wrists and arms, scraped at the skin of his bare chest and cracked the corner of his lips where it was pulled tight.

Dick struggled in his bonds, rocking his body as much as he could within the confines of the restraints and his pained and weakened condition from abuse. After tying him the two orderlies he’d gotten the jump on had taken great pleasure in beating the crap out of him. He knew the feeling of cracked ribs well enough to recognize that he had at least three. He could feel a bleeding wound at the back of his head from when he been punched so hard the chair had fallen back and his head smacked against the floor. He also knew that a few bones in his right wrist were cracked, having felt the muscles tear as they had bound his wrists behind the chair. 

Dick’s bruised and battered body protested against the vigorous struggling but that didn’t stop him. He attempted to loosen the rope gag by pushing at it with his tongue but it held tight. A cold sweat racked his body and Dick knew he was in rough shape. He could feel it. He was no longer hooked up to an IV feeding him vital nutrients and he could feel its loss as his body just felt exhausted now. His body was weak and getting worse and he wanted nothing more than to surrender. But he couldn’t. 

Wouldn’t. No, Dick would fight the whole way until he escaped or his friends found him.

“You know, Mr. Grayson, it is a real shame our time together was cut short. I was going to release you eventually but only when your treatment was complete.” The Doctor spoke from across the room as he watched Dick, coming to stand in front of his captive. He was still hiding his identity, eyes covered by those damn mirrored glasses that forced Dick to stare at himself whenever the man looked at him, lower half covered by the surgical mask and voice changer modifying any chance Dick could have of identifying his voice. Dick stopped his struggles and glared at the man.

“I’m very disappointed in you. Because of your brash decision to call for help, your treatment will now be nothing more to you than mental anguish, struggling to deal with what you just experienced rather than a meaningful experiment.” 

Dick just continued to stare.

“This would have been phase three of your treatment. Sensory deprivation. It's an extremely effective way to break the human spirit. But now, it’ll just serve as our last encounter.” The Doctor pulled a thick strip of black cloth out of the pocket of his lab coat. He walked around to stand behind Dick and pulled it roughly over Dick’s eyes, tying it excruciatingly tight behind his head. Moving to stand directly in front of the blinded man, he backhanded Dick hard across the face, forcing his head to snap to the side.

“All my work, all my effort to bring you here. The methodical and beautiful treatments I had carefully constructed and now here I am resorting to physical brutishness,” he backhanded him again, this time across the other cheek. A muffled yell escaped from behind the packing in Dick’s mouth as he felt the skin crack across his cheek, but it was ignored. 

“Ruined in seconds. At least I got to have my fun.” One more backhand on the other side of Dick’s face and the metallic taste of blood filled his mouth. Bound as he was to the chair, Dick couldn’t even try to escape yet another slap, grunting in pain, his eyes watering behind the blindfold. 

“I don’t know that your friend Superboy that you called out for even heard you, but I will not take the risk,” the Doctor gripped him by the chin and lifted his head, staring down at the blindfolded young man. 

The Doctor threw Dick’s head back and suddenly Dick felt a blinding pain in his hip as he was stabbed. Dick screamed in pain, the sound swallowed by the cloth filling his mouth. Blindfolded as he was he didn’t see the Doctor force a scalpel into his left side, right near his kidney. The blade was twisted and Dick couldn't help but plead behind the gag for it to stop, begging for him to just end it. The Doctor left the blade hilt-deep in Dick’s side for a moment before yanking it out. The blade had been narrow and long, causing optimal pain and damage internally without leaving a gaping wound that would result in his patient not bleeding out too quickly. 

“Mmm….mmm,” Dick slumped in the chair, pulling in ragged breaths through the pain, unable to see his captor smile at him as his eyes traveled up and down his helpless form. 

“My hired help is loading up the equipment as we speak. This place will be cleared out. All that will remain is a dying boy left with terrible memories. If your friends do manage to save you, I do believe we will meet again. Maybe for round two one day.” That was the last thing Dick heard before the Doctor placed noise-canceling headphones over Dick’s ears, slowly moving away from his captive and leaving him alone in the basement of the building he’d been captive in for far too long. Dick’s head fell to his chest, hanging limply. 

He couldn’t see, couldn’t speak, couldn’t hear. All Dick could was feel. He could feel the cracked ribs from the beating, could feel his face swelling, the shivers wracking his body. He could feel the labored breathing, the pain in his right wrist.

He didn’t even try to fight the restraints again. He just stayed there with his head bowed, trembling, soft moans and whimpers lost in the gag.

He didn’t know how much more he could take, how long he could last like this. He knew he had to hold on till his team or Bruce came for him. But his thoughts began to fade and he surrendered to unconsciousness, hanging limply against his bindings.

 

___________________________________________________

 

“This is it. Should we wait for backup?” Conner spoke asked as they entered the abandoned office building that had been on the outskirts of Gotham Heights. It looked like at one time it had been a walk-in clinic but had long since been abandoned. 

He and Batman had driven around Gotham for the last hour, trying to get closer to the sound of Dick, faint sounds that grew louder as they neared his location. Now to Conner’s super hearing, all he heard was Dick’s labored breathing, but it was almost as if Dick was standing next to him.

“We’re not waiting. They’re on their way. Contact Robin and your team, and have them, Superman and Flash on standby securing the perimeter,” Batman ordered, surveying the immediate area. It appeared they were alone, but Bruce wasn’t taking any chances, but he wasn’t waiting any longer. “You go left, I’ll go right.” 

As he made his way down the right hall, all the doors to empty examination rooms were either open or hanging off their hinges; except for one at the end of the hall. 

Batman briefly entertained the idea of trying to pick the lock but settled for kicking the door down instead. He slowly made his way down the staircase, his hands hovered at his utility belt, assessing the threat level of the room. It was dark and appeared to be empty. He crept silently deeper into the room until a faint light from the small cellar window cast a pathetic stream of light over a hunched figure seated in a chair. Bare-chested, skin torn and bruised, barefoot and wearing only thin scrubs pants, a trail of blood traveling down the body’s left hip and down his leg.

“Dick,” Bruce whispered, running over to the chair. He knelt down onto his knees and rested one hand upon the unconscious boy’s neck, feeling for a pulse, both relieved and worried to find the faint fluttering of one. Before doing anything else he checked Dick’s body for wounds causing immediate danger. The only cause for immediate concern was the stab wound at Dick’s left side. He had to stem the blood flow so Dick wouldn’t bleed out. He reached into his utility belt where he kept some first aid supplies for quick fixes while still out on patrol. He grabbed a 4”x4” square bandage and some gauze. With a quick wipe of the blood away with the gauze, he quickly and gently pressed the padded center over the wound and pressed it firmly to adhere to Dick’s skin. He tried to ignore the panic at how quickly the white material started to splotch red but it would stem the blood flow for now. He moved a gloved hand back to Dick’s neck, the pulse still fluttering beneath his fingers. His other hand cupped the unconscious figure’s cheek, tilting his head up, revealing the blindfolded face, rope triple layered between his teeth gagging the boy. 

“Oh god,” Bruce gasped. He removed the noise canceling headphones first, throwing them to the floor. Next, he pulled the blindfold off over the boys’ head, making the face visible; Dick’s face. Leaning up on his knees, Bruce tilted Dick’s head forward, resting it on his armored shoulder as he worked to untie the knot of the rope gagging his surrogate son. Getting it loose, Bruce sat back on his heels, supporting Dick’s head up with one hand resting on the side of the neck while the other hand Bruce used to hook a finger around the rope in his mouth and pulled it away from Dick’s teeth, letting it hang around his neck. He grazed the bruised and cracked corners of Dick’s lips and then reached into Dick’s mouth with his gloved finger and thumb and pulled out the soaked cloths. He dropped them to the floor and with both hands held Dick’s face, cupping his cheeks.

“Hey, Dick, I’m here. Please, wake up,” Bruce all but whispered, gently shaking Dick’s face, trying to coax some life from his dear friend. Dick was pale, dried blood painted his face from the corners of his mouth and the right side of his face heavily streaked with blood that had spilled from a gash. If it wasn’t for the pulse he felt before, he would have thought his son was dead. The heat radiating from Dick’s body added more worry; on top of his injuries, the last thing Dick needed was an infection. After what seemed like an eternity, finally, Dick groaned, his head twitching in Bruce’s grasp.

“That’s it. Come on, Dick.” Bruce urged the boy to open his eyes, moving one gloved hand to stroke through Dick’s dark hair, some strands caked with dried blood at the back of his head. Dick’s eyes gave away everything. He longed for those blue eyes to appear and have life in them. A little more coaxing from Batman and Dick’s eyelids fluttered open.  
“That’s it.” Dick blinked slowly at the sight of Batman, the white eyes of the cowl staring back at him. Bruce could feel Dick try to pull away, could see the fear in his eyes.

“Dick, it’s okay. It’s me. You’re safe now. It’s me, Bruce.” 

The fear suddenly vanished and Dick opened his mouth to speak, but with the cloth and rope gag in for over an hour, his jaw was sore, his lips cracked, palate dry. He licked his lips and tried again. This time he managed a quiet whisper of a breath that sounded like ‘Bruce’.

“Superboy, I’ve got him, ” Bruce spoke into his comm.

“Oh thank god.” Conner’s relief mirrored Bruce’s as he responded. “I’ll come help.”

“Negative. Stand by, I’m bringing him up.”

“The team is here with the Bioship waiting, Batman,” he heard Superman come through the radio.

Still kneeled in front of the chair, Batman slowly pulled his hand away from Dick’s face, allowing the young man a little time to gain the strength to keep his head upright. He reached for his boot knife and started by cutting at the leg ropes and then moved to the arm bindings.

“I’m sorry, Bruce,” Dick struggled, voice just above a whisper before pain took over and his words turned into a moan. He started coughing, tears of pain and relief rolling down his dirt-stained cheeks. Bruce stopped what he was doing to cup Dick’s face between his hands again.

“God Dick, what did they do to you?” Bruce choked out, aware of his own tears rolling down, staying trapped behind the cowl. Dick’s head leaned into Batman’s gloved hands as he held his face, gloved thumbs softly stroking Dick’s cheeks. 

Dick muttered about fractured sentences about hallucinations and pain but Bruce didn’t ask him to elaborate; there would be time for that later when Dick was safe and healing in medbay.

“I’m going to get you home, Dick.” Batman reluctantly pulled away from Dick’s face again to cut at the chest rope. Before he cut at them, he grazed a hand over the ’R’ symbol carved into Dick’s chest that was beginning to scab over. Batman took a deep breath to settle the rage burning inside of him and then proceeded to cut at the ropes digging into Dick’s chest. Dick instantly slumped forward as the ropes holding him to the chair fell away, too weak to hold himself up. Bruce caught him, wrapping his arms around the injured boy’s bare, bruised back. 

He could feel Dick lift his arms up behind his back, hands clenching at Batman’s cape in tight fists, his body shaking.

“I’m so sorry. It’s my fault,” he heard Dick whisper into his neck.

“You have nothing to be sorry for,” Bruce whispered back, bringing a hand to the back of Dick’s head, holding the young man close. “Can you walk?”

“I think so,” Dick pulled away slightly so Bruce could shift his body, one arm behind Dick’s back and wrapping around his waist, the other he used to drape Dick’s left arm over his shoulders, his hand holding firm to Dick’s wrist. As Bruce slowly lifted Dick out of the chair, he couldn’t help but grit his teeth as Dick let out a cry of pain. 

“Dick, let me carry-“

“No,” Dick breathed heavy, “I can walk. Just, go slow.” 

And they did as they climbed the stairs. Dick kept his head down the whole way, eyes squeezed closed, breathing through clenched teeth as they made their way through the building and out the front door.

Up ahead stood Kid Flash, Superboy, Robin, Superman, Flash, Kal’dur, Artemis and Miss Martian, waiting not so patiently by the Bioship. The perimeter had been secured and there were no traces of Dick’s captors anywhere in the area.  
“Dick!” Tim exclaimed moved to go to his mentor and older brother.

“Tim, wait,” M’gann grabbed his arm, stopping the boy’s movements. Conner who stood beside Tim looked over the teenager’s head to look to M’gann’s who was standing on the other side of the third Robin. She met Conner’s gaze with worried eyes. “Something’s wrong.” She could sense fear and anguish radiating from Dick as he lifted his head, seeing his teammates and friends just a few yards away.

“No, no,” Bruce heard Dick whisper, the young man stopping in his tracks. 

“Dick, what’s wrong?” Bruce tried to urge him forward but Dick shook off the arms supporting him and staggered backward. 

“This is a trick, another trick. You’re not real. None of this is real,” Dick was backing away slowly, his voice barely above a whisper. Kid Flash and Artemis went to take a step towards Dick when the twenty-year-old shouted, “Stay away!”  
“Dick?“ Wally pleaded, confused.

“Stay back!” Batman commanded at them, holding an arm out, never tearing his eyes away from the young man in front of him. “He seems to be reliving some sort of deep walking hallucination. He sees us but he doesn’t believe we’re actually real.”

“You’re not real!” Dick shouted at him. “They all died! I was taken and they all died. And the league was turned! They’ve gone rogue, I have to-no. No!” Dick was warring with himself, grabbing at his head, fingers threaded tightly in his hair. “No, none if it happened. It was a trick.”

“Dick, please,” Bruce’s voice was raised, trying to get through to the young man, careful not to make any sudden movements towards him. He simply raised a hand out to him. “You’re safe. It’s over.”

“They all died! I watched it! They all died trying to save me!” He cried, tears streaming down his face, shouting at Batman, eyes desperate. 

“Dick, none of that was real,” Bruce tried to reassure.

“I was supposed to protect them! They were my team, but I wasn’t strong enough!” He doubled over, arms wrapped around his abdomen as if in severe pain, before standing straight up again to face them. “Do you know what that feels like! They all died for me! Do you know what that feels like?”

“Too well,” Batman answered.

“But I’m not worth it,” Dick shook his head, eyes gazing at them all as if begging for forgiveness, tear streaming down his eyes.

“That’s not true,” Superboy spoke up from behind Batman, stepping forward.

“Your team believes you are,” Kid Flash added. Dick doubled over again, bent in half as he was wracked with sobs.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” Dick cried. As Batman approached him, Dick took a swing at him. The first punch landed at Batman’s chest but Dick was so weak it barely connected. Bruce quickly caught the second swing headed for his jaw and held tight to Dick’s wrists.

“Dick, enough!” Batman yelled, careful not to hold Dick’s wrists too tightly.

“You’re not Batman! This is a trick!” Dick yelled back before his legs gave out, buckling beneath him till he fell to his knees. Bruce lowered himself down, still holding the boy’s outstretched wrists in his hands

“Dick this is real,” Bruce whispered. “You are here, your team is alive, and we are here with you.” Dick just shook his head and Bruce wasn’t sure that Dick was even hearing him.

“I really thought I was out this time,” Dick whispered as he bowed his head down to his extended left arm, eyes and forehead pressed into the crook of the limb, not even trying to release Bruce’s hold on his wrists.  
“Look at me,” Bruce pleaded. 

“No,” Dick let out in an anguished sigh, his head slowly shaking back and forth, face still hidden by his arm, fingers clenching into fists in Batman’s hands. “No, this is another dream. I'm still there.”

“Dick, you're safe now, you’re out,” Batman dropped Dick’s wrists and moved to clutch at his shoulders, shaking him gently. He wasn’t sure what Dick was talking about but knew that boy was reliving some sort of hallucination. Desperate to get through to him, Bruce pushed back his cowl and let it hang over the back of his neck. He heard a shocked gasp from behind him where the team stood watching. Batman never removed his cowl while in the field, wouldn’t take the risk of exposure. “Dick, look at me.”

Dick finally looked up with a pleading, pained expression, the sight of Bruce’s face causing the young man to begin to sob.

“Bruce you have to find me. You have to get me out of here” Dick’s begged, collapsing against Bruce’s chest, hands clawing to grab onto the suit as he cried. “Please, Bruce, you have to find me, I don't know how much more I can take.” 

Bruce had one arm wrapped around Dick’s lean waist, the other resting at the back of Dick’s head. Dick moved his arms around Bruce, clenching at his cape as his arms encased his back. Dick had his face buried into Bruce’s armored chest, his body shaking, breathing staggered and labored.

“Miss Martian,” Batman called out to M’gann, never breaking his hold on Dick. She flew towards them, reaching out a hand towards Dick. Laying her hand gently atop the head pressed to Bruce’s chest, her eyes glowed green and Dick collapsed into unconsciousness against Bruce. He effortlessly gathered the sleeping young man, an arm beneath Dick’s knees and shoulders, his head lay upon Bruce’s armored shoulder. 

Bruce sighed in relief, nodding his thanks to M’gann as he carried his precious charge towards the Bioship where the young team, and even the weathered heroes, looked traumatized. 

They waited until Bruce had boarded before filing in. With M’gann at the helm, she instructed the Bioship to manifest a padded bench at the side of the main area. Bruce gently lowered Dick to lay across the bench. Unfastening his cape, Bruce draped it over the shivering young man before coming to sit beside him, cautiously lifting Dick’s head to rest atop Bruce’s left thigh, and lay his arm across Dick’s chest, a firm hand moved right over’s Dick’s heart, feeling the shallow rise and fall as Dick breathed. 

As everyone got settled in, Conner came to sit on the bench at Dick’s feet, not saying a word as he just stared down at Dick. The ship took off and Clark came to stand in front of where Bruce sat.

“We’ll take you both home where he can rest-” 

“No,” Batman interrupted Superman. “I don’t want him where he can be found. Dick Grayson was taken the other night, not Nightwing. I don’t like the idea of him being somewhere that people know how to find him.”

“Alright,” Clark said softly, hearing the fear in Bruce’s voice. Something he rarely ever heard or saw from the man. “We’ll take him to the Watchtower. The Medbay is better equipped anyway.”

“Have Mal send for Alfred.” At Clark’s nod before walking away, Bruce sighed and looked down at Dick, whose head lolled in his lap. His face was caked with blood that was cut through by tracks from his tears. Bruce pulled at the edge of the cape up to cover Dick’s shoulders.

“Bruce?” Conner interrupted his worried ministrations. Bruce reluctantly shifted his gaze up to his left where Conner was staring at him expectantly. 

“You did good Conner. Thank you,” was Bruce’s reply to a question he wasn’t asked. Conner wanted to ask if Dick would be okay, but he knew no one had that answer yet. Before he could say anything else, Dick suddenly cried out, a wave of intense pain consuming him. 

“Dick!” Bruce shouted, gripping Dick’s arm. He let out another cry and a pain filled moan, clenching his eyes closed and pushed his head back against Bruce‘s leg. Conner moved to hover over Dick, Clark, and Barry rushing over, their concern for their young teammate intensifying as they saw blood begin to spill out of his mouth.

“He’s bleeding internally,” Bruce called out as Barry told the young team to stand back.

“He’s not going to make it to the Watchtower!” Clark shouted. “Miss Martian take us to Mount Justice! Kal’dur contact Dr. Palmer and tell him to meet us there and to ready Medbay!” 

“Dick, hang on! Just hang on!” Conner was frantic when he saw more blood spill from Dick’s mouth as his body struggled to breathe. He pulled Batman’s cape off of Dick’s body and grabbed for Dick’s hand, holding on tightly.  
Kid Flash dashed to the back of the ship and grabbed the medical kit, rushing it to Bruce who was now hovered over Dick. Tim kneeled on the bench by Dick’s head, two hands firmly planted on Dick’s shoulders, trying to keep the older member of their family steady.

“He’s not breathing!” Tim called out to Bruce who was already prepping a portable oxygen pump. Placing the mask over Dick’s mouth and nose, Bruce rhythmically squeezed the bag, providing Dick with the air he needed.

“Dick, just hang in there,” Tim pleaded, unaware of the tears beginning to fall down his cheeks. Dick’s eyes stayed locked up onto Bruce’s as his mentor hovered over him, his sole source of oxygen coming from the pumping of the bag in Bruce’s hands. Conner’s hand held onto Dick’s tightly and desperately as the grip went lax.

 

_____________________________________________ 

 

The last 10 hours passed by in a blur. The moment they got to the mountain, Barry had flashed Dick to Medbay where Dr. Palmer had operated on him. He had four bruised ribs, three cracked. One of his cracked ribs punctured his left lung and caused it to collapse, which had what caused Dick to stop breathing while they were on the bioship. Luckily the medical team had been able to suction out the excess air by inserting a needle in Dick’s chest near the area of the collapsed lung. He also had quite a bit of internal bleeding in his lower abdomen from a tear in his left kidney as a result of the knife wound. In addition to the tear, it had been badly bruised, most likely a result from the beating he endured. They had been able to drain the blood and fortunately only needed to remove part of the kidney. Palmer was able to patch him up and assured Bruce that Dick would recover, at least physically. 

Bruce sat in the chair beside Dick’s bed, just he and the injured boy alone in Medbay. Based on Dick’s reaction after being rescued, he did not want to risk upsetting the young man by having Dick’s teammates in the room. Much to the chagrin of their friends, they were instructed to stay outside of the room, for now. Alfred had been the only one allowed by his side for most of the evening, but Bruce sent him home over an hour ago with a promise to call if anything changed. Bruce had wanted to go out and hunt for whoever had done this to Dick, but Alfred convinced him that a manhunt would do nothing to help Dick now. So Bruce had stayed, knowing the older man was right, knowing that it wasn’t Batman that Dick needed now, it was Bruce Wayne.

So here he stayed. It felt like Bruce had stared at Dick’s face for every moment since he came out of the surgery, memorizing every detail of the young man, a young man he considered to be much like a son to him, allowing the image to sink in. Dick was running a fever and the IV hooked up to Dick’s right hand, the one immobilized in a sling so he wouldn’t jar the injured wrist, was pumping him full of antibiotics as well as providing much-needed nourishment to his body. The wrist was nearly broken, Bruce suspected from a mix of struggling, abuse and being restrained so tightly. Both of his wrists were wrapped in gauze; they had been raw and bloody and Bruce suspected it was from struggling against the restraints. His ankles were wrapped similarly, various bandages also wrapped around infected welts at his knees, elbows, and shoulders. It was clear that Dick had been bound tightly his entire time missing. It was also clear that Dick had struggled and fought back. About the only injury that wasn’t infected was the scarring ‘R’ symbol carved into his chest. Palmer said it was made with surgical precision and would fade into a scar over time.

Dick’s head was tilted slightly to the side on his pillow, an oxygen mask covering his pale and drawn face; his fever-flushed cheeks the only color in his skin. White butterfly bandages covered a gash Bruce remembered seeing on the left side of Dick’s cheek. He also knew there were bandages at the back of Dick’s skull where he had felt dried blood when he’d found him. 

Bruce hadn’t left his side since he came out of surgery, having changed out of his uniform while Dick was being treated. He wanted Dick to only see Bruce Wayne when he woke up, having seemed scared at the sight of Batman initially upon rescuing him. So now Bruce was dressed simply in a black t-shirt and dark jeans, jogging sneaker-clad feet bouncing anxiously as he watched his sleeping ward. 

The blankets were pulled up to the mid-section of Dick’s chest. The plunging neckline of the scrubs shirt revealed the top of the wrappings he was sure covered Dick from his chest to his waist, not only wrapping the ribs but covering the cuts all over his torso. The wires from the pads attached to his chest monitoring his vitals connected to machines and screens that brought comfort to Bruce, the sounds and images reassuring him that Dick’s heart was strong. 

“Dick,” Bruce spoke quietly. “I can’t stop thinking about what happened to you. What they did to you. How much they must have hurt you to make you afraid of your friends.” Bruce closed his eyes, sighing. “I hate that this happened to you. I hate that I couldn’t protect you from that,” Bruce fought back the tears he knew were swelling at his eyes. Bruce could count on one hand the things that could lead him to lose control of his tightly bottled emotions. His parents were one, the young man before him was another.

He reached out a hand and lay it on Dick’s shoulder. He squeezed it, gentle but solid, hoping Dick could feel it and know he wasn’t alone. “But I want you to know, that you will not have to go through this alone. We’re all here for you. For however long it takes, we will be there. We’re a family.” 

Bruce leaned his other arm on the chair armrest and brought his hand to face, scrubbing it over his eyes, before resting his chin on it. He rubbed up and down Dick’s uninjured arm before resting his hand on Dick’s bandaged wrist that covered the chafed skin. His fingertips softly rested against his pulse point. Even through the wrappings, Bruce could feel the steady pulse of Dick. So he kept his hand there as he watched the young man. Staying like that, Bruce lost track of time; forgot about sleep, forgot about patrol, about going after the man with the tattoo from the Bat Killers whose identity he didn’t know. He just focused on Dick’s pulse. 

Suddenly Dick’s hand twitched beneath his, head slowly rolling from side to side. Bruce leaned forward, squeezing Dick’s hand in his own and gently laying the other atop Dick’s head, fingers brushing through Dick’s hair. 

"Hey," he said, gently stroking the side Dick‘s face with the back of his fingers, "Dick, you're okay," Bruce said softly as Dick’s eyes fluttered open, blinking, trying to get his eyes to focus. Dick fought to keep his eyes open, his hand reaching slowly for his oxygen mask, pulling it aside. 

“Alive?” Dick asked breathlessly, lettings his hand drop. 

“Yes, Dick. You’re safe and you’re alive,” Bruce reassured as he leaned forward, placing the oxygen mask back over Dick's mouth and nose. Dick blinked a few times, trying to focus through the haze of pain medication. 

“No. Team, alive?” Dick’s brow furrowed, his voice slightly muffled by the mask.

“Everyone’s alive,” Bruce nodded, noticing how the lines in Dick’s face instantly eased upon receiving the answer. 

“You don’t…have to stay,” Dick said quietly, reaching up once again and pulling the mask off his face. Bruce could hear the hesitance in his voice and smiled sadly. In Dick’s own way, not wanting to be completely vulnerable in front of Bruce, he let him know that he felt guilty for wanting him to stay with him. He knew he didn’t want to be alone. He’d been alone and away from his family for far too long as far as Bruce was concerned. 

“I’m not going anywhere.” Bruce moved his hand to once again position the oxygen mask back over his mouth and nose. “Leave it,” he whispered, moving his hand to rest on Dick’s pale, bruised cheek. 

“Bruce?” Dick’s voice hardly made it past the mask, his eyes fluttering closed as he began to give into exhaustion. 

“I‘m right here, Dick,” Bruce said quietly, his thumb stroking gently across his cheek. 

“Bruce?” Dick whispered again before his eyes finally closed. 

“Yeah,” he whispered back. 

“No snoring,” Dick said quietly, a ghost of a smile on his cracked lips beneath the mask, his eyes still closed. Bruce couldn't stop the laugh. There it was. A sign that Dick was going to be okay. 

“No promises,” Bruce smiled sadly. Bruce continued to stroke Dick’s hair until the young man fell back asleep. He couldn’t help but notice how frail Dick looked under the oxygen mask; how damaged he looked lying in the bed. But despite it all, Bruce couldn’t help but smile. He was safe and alive. That was all that mattered.

 

_______________________________________

 

Clark walked down the hallway to medbay, hoping to try to convince Bruce to allow him to sit vigil of Dick for a change and get some rest. He’d turned the corner and was met with an impenetrable wall of hovering young heroes. He was touched by their devotion but still, Clark folded his arms over his chest and gave them his best impression of the Bat stare.

“I thought I told you all to eat and get some rest.”

“Hey,” Wally held up both hands, “We ate! Meghan made us all PBJ’s and we sat in awkward nervous silence as we scarfed them down.”

“It was practically like resting, ” Tim added.

“Now if you don’t mind,” Artemis spoke up next, “we’re just going to take a quick peek and see if Dick-“

“Is probably still sleeping. Like you should be,” Clark interrupted Artemis. 

“As team co-leader-” Kaldur tried but was quickly shot down with a look from Clark.

“Guys, this isn’t up for debate,” Clark Kent was replaced by Superman in that moment and the team acquiesced. “You saw how freaked out he was, we don’t want to risk upsetting him while he’s still in a weakened condition until we know more information.”

“We understand,” M’gann sighed, reaching out to hold Tim’s hand in comfort. “We’ll come back in the morning.”

She, Artemis, Tim, Kaldur, and Wally left without further argument, talking quietly as they headed down the corridor. Conner took a few steps behind them before turning back around to face Clark, who bit back a rebuke when he read the worry etched all over his younger counterpart’s face. 

“He’s going to be okay, Clark, right?”

“Kon-“

“I just need to know,” the uncertainty in his tone, so contrary to the Superboy’s usual gravitas had Clark questioning whether or not to allow the young man in to check on Dick. 

“I promise, soon you will. But for now, it’s best if-“

“Fine,” Conner interrupted curtly. “But the second he’s able.”

“I promise,” Clark clasped Conner assuringly on the arm before the young man turned reluctantly to head down to his quarters. 

Clark sighed and just as he went to enter the Medbay room, Barry and Oliver turned the corner and headed towards him.  
“Sent the kids to bed?” Oliver asked.

“They’re concerned. Can’t blame them,” Barry added as they came to stand by the door with Clark. “Ollie, be grateful you didn’t see it. Poor Dick, I’ve never seen him like that.”

“It traumatized the others too,” Clark thread his hand through his hair, trying to shake off the memory of seeing a young man they all cared about racked with terror, anguish, and fear at the sight of the people that cared most about him.  
“Bruce still in there?” Oliver asked.

“Sounds like it,” Clark nodded, confirming their suspicions with a brief use of his super hearing to hear the two heartbeats.

“Well, maybe the three of us can convince him to go get some rest and we’ll watch over Dick,” Barry’s voice was no more than a whisper as he opened the door and the three league members walked in.

They were all slightly amused, mildly concerned, and not all that surprised to find Bruce asleep in the chair beside Dick’s bed. He was slumped forward, his left arm pillowed his head atop the mattress while his right hand loosely held Dick’s limp one. It had been twelve hours since Dick woke the first time and hadn’t been awake since.  
As they approached, they didn’t dare wake him, knowing he hadn’t slept much since they found Dick, not wanting to disturb the rare resting period he was allowing himself. 

Barry came around to the opposite side of the bed from where Bruce slept in the chair, listening to the heart monitor’s soft, rhythmic beeps, mesmerized by the EEG’s oscillation. He was unable to help himself as he untangled the snagged I.V. line connected to Dick’s wrist. Oliver moved to the foot of the bed, looking at Dick’s chart with Dr. Palmer’s notes of his monitored condition, blood pressure, pulse, respiration, all the facts and figures that told them Dick was on his way to healing.

Clark just came to stand beside the chair housing the sleeping vigilante and watched Dick’s pale, peaceful face underneath the oxygen mask; using his advanced hearing to listen to Dick’s heartbeat itself, drowning out the machines. Dick’s chest rose and fell with slow, even breaths, a line between his brows standing out as it appeared to Clark that Dick was thinking, even in sleep. 

They were all shaken out of their daze as Dick sucked in a sharp breath beneath the mask, the furrow in his brow deepening. He shifted beneath the covers and turned his head towards Barry’s direction, his eyes opening slowly. 

Confusion was the first thing he experienced upon waking. As he took stock of his surroundings, the machines, the IV, the mask over his face, anxiety quickly replaced confusion. When he saw Barry, Oliver, and Clark, panic overtook him  
Dick sprung forward with a jolt and a gasp, his hand pulling free from Bruce’s hold, waking the other man. He clawed at the oxygen mask, tearing it off of his face, before yanking the IV out of his hand. 

“No!” Dick rasped, throwing the blankets off his legs and scrambling to get out of the bed. All four of the leaguers sprang forward, trying to stop Dick. Dick landed a hard punch at Barry, taking the speedster by surprise before kicking out at Oliver.

Barry and Clark each grabbed one of his arms and got a hold on his upper body while Oliver grabbed his legs, holding Dick down to the cot. 

“No! Let me go! Have to save you! Have to save the league!” Dick’s shouts went ignored as Barry and Clark holding his arms wrestled them down to his side.

“Dick!” Bruce hovered over him, strong hands grasping the sides of his neck, willing the frantic boy to look at him. “Dick stop struggling! We’re trying to help you!”

“Bruce we should sedate him!” Oliver shouted over Dick’s screams.

“No! He has to work through this!” Bruce shouted back, knowing that if they sedated him, Dick would have a harder time disassociating what happened to him then versus what was happening now. Dick writhed as best he could against the men restraining him, twisting and pulling but he was held down good.

“There’s no way I’ll just accept this! It’s not real!” As Dick pulled at the hold Barry had on his already injured arm he could feel the wrist break. The pain didn’t even register over his fearful and frantic mind.

“Dick, you need to calm down!” Bruce tried not to shout, trying to will the panicked eyes darting all across the room to settle on him. 

“Turned! Bruce, they’re turned!” Dick shouted, eyes going from Oliver to Barry to Clark and back, tears streaming down his face as he struggled. All he could feel was terror, memories of pain as he looked at the unmasked faces of the Flash, Green Arrow, Superman, and Batman.

“Dick, it wasn’t real! None of it was real!” Barry shouted over Dick’s cries.

“Bruce he’s going to hurt himself! We need to sedate him or restrain him,” Oliver pleaded with his colleague, sing blood soaking through Dick’s scrubs shirt where he had been stabbed. All the thrashing had pulled Dick’s stitches.

“No, no, no, please don’t tie me down again,” Dicks angry shouting melted suddenly to despair, his strength weakening. “Please no more, please don’t drug me.”

“Dick, focus!” Bruce shook the boy by his shoulders before returning to cup the sides of his neck, Dick panting, brow furrowed, distress written all across his face. “Dick, look at me!”

Dick’s watery gaze finally settled on Bruce’s steel gray eyes and suddenly he stopped all his struggling. Oliver, Clark, and Barry eased up on their grip on Dick as his scrambling ceased, letting go and standing by in case Dick had another fit. 

Dick didn’t say anything, as he sprang forward in the bed, wrapping both arms around Bruce, the uninjured hand fisting the material at the back of Bruce’s t-shirt while his now broken one just settled up at Bruce’s shoulder blades. Bruce cupped the back of Dick’s head and wrapped one arm behind Dick’s back, cradling him against him tightly. Bruce could feel Dick’s body trembling, overwhelmed by pain and fear as he cried. Bruce’s fingers stroked through the dark hair, his chin resting atop the boy’s head, unable to stop his own tears from falling. He dismissed the desire to wipe them away, focused on providing as much comfort as possible to the young man in his arms. 

Bruce listened carefully as Dick kept whispering something into the crook of his neck, his breath ragged. It took a few minutes before Bruce realized Dick was whispering ‘please be real’ over and over. Bruce continued to stroke through Dick’s hair, whispering back to him that ‘it’s real’ as Dick’s sobbing ceased. 

Dick finally pulled back from the embrace, unfolding his arms from around his mentor. Bruce kept his hands firmly holding onto Dick’s biceps, keeping the young man at arm's length.

“I’m okay,” Dick rasped quietly around short, shallow breaths, eyes still closed. It was all the voice he could manage as he lifted his uninjured hand to his face, swiping at his cheek with his palm and then using the back to wipe at the tears rolling from his chin. Bruce wasn’t sure if Dick was trying to reassure Bruce or himself but Bruce was more concerned with Dick’s panting, his breathing labored, his chest heaving as he tried to pull air into his lungs/

“You need to calm down, Dick,” Bruce spoke as he reached up to brush aside Dick’s hair that had matted to his forehead with sweat stemming from his frantic struggling just moments ago and could feel the heat radiating off Dick’s skin as the fever still racked his body. Bruce reached for the discarded oxygen mask and tried to place it over Dick’s face but Dick pushed it away.

“Dick, you need help breathing,” Bruce with the help of Clark positioned Dick back against the bed, Bruce placing the mask over Dick’s mouth and nose. “Take slow and deep breaths.”

“What's happening, Bruce?” Oliver asked, focused on the young man lying in the bed.

“He either exasperated his condition or is suffering from a panic attack,” Bruce answered. Out of his peripheral vision, he saw Barry zoom out of the room, knowing he was going to get help. Bruce’s eyes never wavered from Dick who had his eyes squeezed tightly closed, his ragged attempts at breathing escaped from the beneath the oxygen mask. “Dick, breathe!”

Dick nodded as Bruce pulled the straps of the mask over Dick’s head. Dick brought his uninjured hand up to his face to hold the mask.

“That’s it,” Bruce spoke, placing his hand over Dick’s on the mask, “Just like that. Nice and slow deep breaths.”

Dr. Palmer came running in with Barry, rushing to Dick’s beside, positioning the stethoscope on Dick’s chest. 

“Just try to take it easy, Dick,” Dr. Palmer spoke, examining his patient. “He’s torn his stitches. Bruce, get me his blood pressure. Clark, go tell J’onn and the emergency medical team we’re bringing Dick back up and to prep for surgery.”

Clark quickly flew out of the room as Bruce slid on the blood pressure cuff. 

“Ninety-eight over fifty,” Bruce informed, removing the pressure cuff from Dick’s arm. Barry and Palmer reached from under the bed and pulled up the side rails while Ollie started to pull down the IV bags from the hooks and place them at Dick’s side when the noises from the bed made them refocus their attention.

Dick was choking, making strangling noises as he stopped inhaling, clutching to the mask over his face with his uninjured hand. 

“Dick! You need to breathe, son!” Bruce clasped a hand over Dick’s on the mask, pressing down. Dick’s back arched, gasping underneath the mask. 

“We need to get a CAT scan,” Palmer spoke to no one in particular as he, Oliver, Bruce, and Barry wheeled the bed out of the room and through the hall. “He may have a blood clot in his lung.” 

Bruce had no perception of where they were heading or how long they were pushing the gurney. He kept his focus on the erratic, desperate, fast rise and fall of Dick’s chest as he fought to get the air in his lungs until they reached the ICU wing.

“Guys, I need you to wait outside,” Palmer said as they pushed the gurney in. 

“Doc,” Bruce didn’t finish before Palmer began to cut away at Dick’s scrubs top.

“If you’re going to stay Bruce I need you to help,” Palmer handed Bruce the IV bag, which Bruce promptly hung up on the nearby pole. “The rest of you, out in the hall please.”

Clark, Oliver and Barry quickly and reluctantly left the room, waiting in the hallway behind the closed door. 

“Holy Shit,” Oliver bent over, hands braced on his knees. He’d known Dick since he was twelve and had never seen him so shattered before. 

“Yeah,” Barry leaned back against the wall, Clark crossing his arms as they stood in a small circle. 

“How come he freaked when he saw us?” Oliver asked.

“I don’t know,” Clark shrugged. “We still don’t know what was done to him in those days he was missing. From what we’ve gathered so far, sounds like he was tortured and brainwashed. He thought his team was dead and he seems to think the league’s gone rogue. But he keeps reassuring himself that none of it was real.”

“Why don’t you think he reacted that way when he saw Batman?” Oliver questioned.

“He didn’t see Batman,” Barry answered, looking at his friends.”That was Bruce Wayne in there; no trace of the Bat in sight.”

“And he knows Bruce would never hurt him,” Clark turned toward the door and used his X-ray vision to look through and saw the flurry of activity as J’onn, Palmer and the medical team worked around the young man. Bruce had Dick’s hand firmly clamped in his as Dick’s eyes staying locked onto Bruce as they worked. “And Bruce Wayne is Dick Grayson’s hero.”


	6. Could it be this misery will suffice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Someone come and someone come and save my life  
> Could it be this misery will suffice

“Your stitches have been all patched up. Your lung has been repaired. Palmer said he expects you to make a full recovery, without any more complications. That is if you avoid sudden and harsh movements.” 

“Well that would be nice,” Dick nodded slowly, his free hand fidgeted with the tubing of the nasal cannula helping him with his oxygen intake, his broken wrist tucked in the sling cradled to his chest. He had woken up an hour ago in his original medbay room, bed propped up so that Dick was in a half-seated position. He’d drifted in and out of sleep the last two days since he went back into surgery; had fought down a couple episodes of anxiety and panic at the sight of anyone who wasn’t Bruce, and was finally feeling well enough to sit up. Bruce was seated once more in the chair beside the bed to Dick’s left.

His lung had collapsed again in the struggle when he’d awoken and they had to insert a chest tube between the ribs to remove the extra air and had been attached to a machine to suction out the air from his chest cavity. Palmer said they could probably remove the tube in a few days.

Dick was slightly embarrassed by his reaction upon waking up. But the sight of the oxygen mask, IV, and league had panicked him and Dick was instantly transported back to those days he was captive. He was struggling with it even now but Bruce was the only thing that was anchoring him to reality. His presence was more reassuring than anything else and Dick was thankful for it. Even despite their arguments, their differences and rough patches, they were family and Dick would always be grateful for him.

“Dick,” Bruce said, looking at the younger man. Dick turned his head to look back at Bruce. “You’re going to be okay. You’ll get through this.” 

“Yeah, I know. You just said the Doc said…”

“That’s not what I meant,” Bruce said, interrupting. Dick sighed and looked away, staring at the far wall. They sat in silence, Bruce watching as an array of emotions flickered across Dick’s face as he crinkled his brow and bit the inside of his cheek, appearing to be thinking intently. 

“I don’t,” Dick paused then took a deep breath before continuing, “I don’t know if I can, Bruce. It’s been two days since I woke up screaming at you, Barry, Clark, and Ollie. I can finally look at them now without going into a frenzy but it takes a lot of effort.”

“But you’re doing it,” Bruce placed a hand on Dick’s leg. Through the blanket, Bruce could feel his body shaking. Dick finally looked back at Bruce, his gaze watery, face contorted in anger. Bruce wasn't sure if it was anger towards him for making Dick talk about it; anger towards his abductor for putting him through what he did; or, knowing Dick, anger towards himself for letting his emotions control him so easily. 

“I just don’t know how to do this, Bruce. I’ve been awake, sort of, for two days and have done everything I can to not think about what happened.” As Dick spoke, Bruce could see the tears building up in his eyes, but Dick seemed to be in control of them, willing them not to fall down his cheek. “Because the second I start to, I just lose it. And I don’t want to be that.” “Dick you survived. You can do this.” Bruce spoke quietly. Dick sucked in a deep lungful of air, feeling the chest tube jerk against his side as he did and looked back at the older man. 

Dick knew that Bruce wanted to know more of what happened. Dick knew he had to tell him. He hadn’t been looking forward to it, not wanting to relive every detail that he lived in all the time he’d been gone. With the pain medication, he’d been able to keep the memories from haunting his dreams. With keeping all that happened bottled up inside, he could almost deny that it existed. Almost.

“It started with him cutting into my chest with a scalpel, telling me he knew a few identities but that it really didn’t matter to him. And then the electricity started.” Dick poured to Bruce about what he had experienced, the electroshock conditioning, the hallucinations, visions of death and pain and loss. Bruce was proud of the way Dick kept his composure through it all as he recounted every detail he could think of. There were long pauses of silence as Dick would gather his thoughts, Bruce waiting it out till he could continue his story. As he came to the end where he called out for help before they beat the crap out of him and tied him up in the basement, Bruce’s blood was boiling.

“I failed you Dick,” was all he said. At Dick’s confused look, Bruce continued. “The only reason we found you was because Conner heard your shout for him. If he hadn’t-“

“Bruce, they were too smart to leave anything behind. But you guys found me.”

“It should have been sooner.”

“How long was I gone?”

“Dick…”

“How long, Bruce.”

“Almost nine days.”

“For fuck’s sake,” Dick bent his legs up towards his chest, tucking the arm in the sling between his chest and knees and wrapping his free arm tightly around his drawn up knees. “Bruce they had planned on keeping me for a while. Nine days is a lot, but the Doctor made it sound like it was supposed to be a lot longer.” 

“I should have found you sooner,” Bruce’s voice was hard and laced with guilt as he moved from the chair to sit at the edge of Dick’s bed next to him. Dick knew that nothing he would say would rid Bruce of that guilt. It was something the man carried with him always. 

“Just…” Dick moved his eyes to capture Bruce’s gaze, forcing the older man to make eye contact with him, “keep finding me. You brought me back that night and you're bringing me back now.” 

“Always,” Bruce nodded, squeezing the young man’s shoulder. Dick looked way, lowering his chin to rest upon his drawn knees. 

“The worst part was they kept me bound and gagged the whole time. I couldn't get an ounce of leverage, couldn't fight back. And that gag, shit.” Dick unfolded his body, straightened his legs, leaning back against the stack of pillows in bed. “I’m a talker, Bruce. I talk when I’m excited, when I’m nervous…”

“When you’re bored, when you’re eating, when you’re doing anything.” Bruce’s attempt to get Dick to smile was successful as the boy snorted and punched Bruce playfully in the arm before continuing.

“I felt so violated having that thing lodged in my mouth, that strap around my face. Being robbed of the option…” Dick’s voice trailed off as he brought his hand to rub his eye with the heel of his palm before speaking up again, his voice desperate. “What if this is a dream, a trip? They say that happens in that kind of psychological torture. What if this isn’t real and I’m still back there?”

“Dick, I promise you this is real,” Bruce reached to pull the hand digging into Dick’s eye away, squeezing it tightly.  
“I know you’re right,” Dick looked at him, nodding and squeezing the hand back. “I just can’t shake the feeling. I’ve been really scared the last few days.”

“We all have,” Bruce replied. Nothing else was said, both lost in the space of grief and relief. Before he found himself getting emotional again and sensing that Dick needed an escape from his thoughts, Bruce decided to break the silence and change the subject. “He cares about you, you know?”

“Who?”

“Conner Kent.” Dick’s face blushed and Bruce smiled, pleased with himself. He still couldn’t embarrass the boy but that blush was the closest he was going to get. 

“He’s going to think I’m a nut case after all this and run,” Dick half-joked, futzing once again with the nasal cannula.

“No, Dick, he won’t,” Bruce responded. “Don’t put that wall up. He cares deeply for you. And if it means anything, I don’t disapprove.” 

“Wow, that’s practically a glowing recommendation coming from you,” Dick laughed, rubbing at the back of his neck, looking anywhere but at Bruce.

“I’m serious, Dick. I know how you are. Don’t put up that wall,” Bruce rested his hand once more on Dick’s blanket-covered leg. “If this is what you want, if this makes you happy, hold onto it, Dick. You deserve it.”

Dick ducked his head, blush spreading as Bruce spoke before he looked up and smile this thanks to Bruce.

“Do you think I could see him?”

“You sure you’re ready? We don’t want to overwhelm you,” Bruce was wary. He wasn’t sure what would set Dick off, or even if it was still something they had to worry about. He wanted to protect the boy from any more pain, but the pleading eyes that always had a way of breaking Bruce’s resolve won out again. “Okay, but don’t tell Tim because he’s been nagging me to come to see you for days.”

Dick just smiled in response. Bruce patted his leg as he got up and exited the room, leaving Dick alone for the first time since he’d been rescued.

Dick leaned back against the pillows, closing his eyes, focusing on his breathing, He was left to his thoughts, something he was afraid of. He didn't want to spend another minute on the pain, on the fear, on the memories of hallucinations that plagued his mind. He was alive. His friends were alive. The league was not the enemy. Two thoughts he clung to while he was abducted crossed his mind again. 

‘Bruce had saved me, he always saves me. My name is Dick Grayson, no one can take that away from me.’

He heard the door open and Dick opened his eyes to see Bruce reenter the room, followed by a cautious Conner Kent. Bruce hovered in the background as Conner softly approached Dick’s bedside.

“Hey,” Dick smiled shyly up at Conner, shifting to sit up as he came to stand beside the bed. 

“Hey,” Conner said nervously, shoving his hands in his pockets, not sure what else to do with him. He wanted to wrap Dick in his arms and do nothing but hold him for a week. But Conner didn’t want to upset him, didn’t want to hurt him.

“I’m not going to break,” Dick teased, seemingly reading his mind, patting the open space on the edge of the bed, motioning to Conner. He obliged, cautiously sitting by his side. Conner couldn't help himself as he smoothed the rumpled blanket and tucked it more securely around Dick’s body, causing Dick to chuckle.

Conner quickly stopped his ministrations as Dick laughed, his hands fleeing to his lap as if he was a child caught doing something he wasn’t supposed to. Dick put his hand in Conner’s lap, sliding it between both of Conner’s, holding tight.

Conner looked at Dick. They sat in silence for a few minutes, just holding hands, both unsure of what to say to each other, unsure of where to start. They didn’t notice as Bruce left the room, albeit reluctantly, to give the two men privacy, closing the door behind him. Bruce was nervous to leave Dick alone with someone other than himself, but he had to trust that Dick was well, trust that he would be alright.

“You okay?” It sounded lame to Conner’s own ears as he asked it.

“Not even a little bit,” Dick laughed sadly in reply.

Dick pulled his hand from the hold to bring it up to the base of Conner’s neck and pulled Conner to him, their foreheads touching, staring at each other almost cross-eyed. Conner clasped the forearm by his cheek as Dick’s fingers threaded through the hair at the back of his head, rubbing the scalp with his fingertips, relishing the familiar feel of his lover’s dark hair. Conner slid his other arm around Dick’s waist, scooting closer to Dick and gently pulling them as close to each other as they could sitting on the bed, cautious of the knife wound and chest tube on his left side.

“You’re okay.” It was a statement this time as Conner whispered to Dick, his voice steady and calm and Dick felt safe, nodding against the forehead still pressed to his. 

Conner moved his head only enough to place a kiss upon Dick’s forehead briefly before the hold Dick had on the base of his neck pulled Conner down to his lips. It was a soft brush of the lips at first but Dick tugged at his neck till the kiss was crushing, desperate and hungry. Somewhere over the noise of his own heart beating and Conner’s heavy breaths, Dick could hear his heart monitor speeding up. Conner must have heard it too because he could feel Conner’s lips turn into a smile against his lips and they both started to laugh. They pulled away from the kiss, Conner’s hand still locked to Dick’s forearm and Dick’s hand still entwined in Conner’s hair, bodies still close together as Dick’s heart rate returned to normal. Dick finally released the hold he had on the back of Conner’s neck and adjusted the nasal cannula back into place after being knocked askew from their haphazard kiss. He wanted more, was craving something he could feel, something to know this was all real. But the reality of still being in a hospital bed, still healing, put a damper on what he really needed and wanted from Conner.

“I brought you something!” Conner suddenly remembered, interrupting his thoughts. He reached into his pocket and pulled out his mp3 player. “I figured you might be bored some of the time and could use some music.” He handed one earbud to Dick who positioned it his ear as Conner plugged his own ear with the other and hit play.

Dick couldn’t help but sigh happily as the first sweet and mournful notes of the song played. Joni Mitchell’s ‘The Last Time I Saw Richard’ played on and Dick got lost in the song; a beautiful heartbreaking melody that to Dick represented a battle between the forces of hope and despair, between the joy of being alive and the pain of losing what you hold dearest. Dick began to silently sing along with the song.

'Richard, you haven't really changed, I said. It’s just that now you're romanticizing some pain that's in your head, you got tombstones in your eyes but the songs you punched are dreaming. They talk of love so sweet, love so sweet, when are you gonna get yourself back on your feet?'

The song continued on but Dick pulled on the wire of the earbud, gently tugging it from his ear. Conner took his out too, and brought his hand to Dick’s chin, tilting his boyfriend’s face up to look at him, before resting his palm upon his cheek. 

“I thought I’d lost you,” Conner confessed, his voice quiet. 

“I thought I’d lost you.” Dick leaned his cheek into Conner’s touch before shaking his head, raising his hand to pull Conner’s away from his face. Conner grabbed his hand before he could let it go, bringing it to his lips where he lay a gentle kiss to his bandaged wrist before resting it between his hands, holding it tightly. 

“I didn’t, right?” Dick’s eyes pleaded with him. “This is real?”

“Dick,” Conner responded, leaning in to plant a small kiss upon Dick’s lips. “You didn’t lose me, I didn’t lose you. Whatever they did to you, it happened. But it’s over now, and you’re here with me. This is real, Dick.”

Conner got up and moved to the right side of Dick’s bed, adjusting himself till he was half sitting, half lying beside Dick in the narrow hospital bed to his right. He was seated up taller than Dick, chest at Dick’s head, wrapping his right arm around Dick’s shoulders and pulled him close to him against his chest. He was careful not to aggravate Dick’s injuries, cautious of the arm in the sling. Dick rested his forehead against Conner’s neck, snuggling down to get more comfortable. He pressed his hand against Conner’s chest, just above his heart, the rhythm of Conner’s heartbeat was calming, steady, consistent, and grounding. 

They stayed in silence as Dick started to drift off, his body still in need of healing and rest. As he drifted he could feel a shaky breath leave Conner’s body. 

“You’re okay,” Conner’s voice was quiet with forced certainty, and Dick could tell this time Conner was trying to reassure himself that Dick was indeed okay. He wanted to say something, but Dick was helpless as sleep claimed him against the solid and familiar chest of the man he knew he loved. 

 

_______________________________________________

 

Bruce ran through the dark hall, bare feet slapping against the hardwood floor. He heard Alfred call out behind him as he skids in front of Dick’s bedroom door and threw it open.

Dick was face down on the floor, limbs twisted and tangled in the bed sheets as they hung half suspended from the mattress and coiled around Dick. Dick’s arms were wrapped in the sheet, pinned to his body by the blanket and Dick was thrashing on the floor, screaming, eyes closed. Bruce ran over to the struggling young man, who was clearly in the midst of a horrible nightmare.

Bruce had heard Dick’s screams from down the hall. After a week of healing in Medbay, Bruce had taken Dick home with him to Wayne Manor where his condition could be monitored, where he would continue to rest, and Dick wouldn’t be alone in his apartment on campus. That had been three days ago and Alfred had said that Dick had a nightmare every night since. It usually was something Dick woke himself out of, Alfred hovering outside the door when he would hear the first screams before Dick would jolt awake. Bruce hadn’t been home when they had happened, having been out hunting for the man that did this to Dick, but he was no closer to discovering who the hired thugs were or the doctor that had been the leader of the whole operation.

But tonight, the night Bruce stayed in instead of on patrol, the screams echoed through the house and were a sound Bruce never wanted to hear again. 

“Dick!” Bruce shouted over the boy’s shouts and cries as he dropped to his knees beside him. He tried to pull away the sheet wrapped around the boy, pinning his arms to him but Dick must have got tangled in them thrashing around in the bed before falling off and onto the floor with them. Dick was kicking, landing a few to Bruce’s body as he hovered over him. “Dick, wake up!”

Having had enough wrestling with the sheet, Bruce grabbed the material over Dick’s back and pulling it taught, ripped the material down the middle of where it was restraining Dick. The young man’s nightmares were bad enough, but to be confined like that it had to have put Dick in a state of panic, even in sleep.

“Dick, wake up!” Bruce leaned over Dick’s still jerking body and turned him over on his back. Dick’s eyes were clenched tightly, sweat soaking through his tank and boxers as he convulsed. Bruce quickly shifted his position so he was kneeling at Dick’s head. 

The shaking and calls for the twenty-year-old to wake up weren’t working, leading Bruce to switch tactics. Bruce grabbed Dick’s flailing arms and gathered them to hold his wrists in one hand while he slipped his free arm beneath Dick’s armpit, hoisting up the young man, wrapping his arm around Dick’s midsection. Bruce fell back on his heels as he held Dick tightly to his chest, the young man’s back pressed tightly against his chest.

At the contact, Dick’s screams turned into choked sobs as Bruce held him close, rocking him back and forth. He rested his chin atop Dick’s sweat soaked hair, bringing the hand that wasn’t holding Dick’s wrists up to push back the sweat-soaked hair from Dick’s eyes, over and over raking his fingers back through his hair trying to soothe him. He whispered for the boy to ‘shhh’ and that ‘its okay’ over and over until the words began to mean nothing as Bruce desperately tried to calm the troubled young man.

Bruce wasn’t sure how long they stayed like that on the floor until Dick’s cries and sobs and shaking faded into to whimpers and then finally into restful slumber clasped in his father’s arms. Bruce didn’t need to look to know that Alfred was standing in the doorway, watching over the two of them. 

Alfred didn’t need to be asked as he crossed the room to slip gentle but strong hands around Dick’s calves. Careful not to jar the burden in his arms, Bruce gained his footing and with Alfred’s help, were able to carry Dick up off the floor and lay him gently atop his bed. Once Dick was settled in bed, Alfred grabbed Bruce into a quick hug, telling the man he was proud of him before leaving Dick’s bedroom. Bruce watched him leave before bringing the armchair on the other side of the room and moving it to Dick’s bedside. Plopping his tired body down into the chair, Bruce watched the slow rise and fall of Dick’s sleeping body before allowing himself to drift off. 

It was early in the morning when Dick awoke. His eyes slowly opened, the harsh light of the morning stabbing through the gaps in the curtains over his bedroom windows. He blinked a few times, his vision adjusting as he became aware of being home at the Manor in his own bed. He saw Bruce asleep in the chair beside his bed and Dick knew it must have been a difficult night last night. He didn’t remember waking at all but for Bruce to feel like he needed to keep vigil all through the night meant it had been a rough night’s sleep. 

He had the sudden urge to get up, coupled with a determination to prove to Bruce as well as himself that he wasn’t as broken as he felt. Dick kicked the blankets off his feet and swung his legs over the edge. He started to push himself up off the bed, legs shaking as his feet hit the floor, and pain lanced through his ribs. He gasped at the intensity of it, bile rose in his throat, blood rushed to his head and his vision swam. Suddenly a strong arm supported his back and another grabbed his elbow as a figure sprung beside him and he found he was gripping at Bruce’s shirt, letting the other man take his weight. 

“I’m fine, Bruce,” Dick sighed as Bruce helped to ease him back to sitting on the edge of the bed. “I just got up too fast. I’m fine.”

“You should be taking it slow and easy, Dick,” Bruce said as he sat beside him.

“If I take it any slower, I’ll be going backward,” Dick grumbled, pulling the arm away from Bruce’s hold and wrapping it around his stomach, cradling his aching body. Every time he woke up it was like while he was sleeping his body had remembered everything he went through. Dick could almost feel the residuals of the jolts of electricity coursing through his body. 

“Dick you have to give yourself time to heal,” Bruce was going for comforting but all Dick heard was condescension. “Dick, listen to me. What you went through, no one expects you to rebound-“

“I’m fine,” Dick spat, agitated, pushing himself off the bed. His legs were still shaky. Palmer said that since he had been confined for over a week and then being on bed rest it would take him a while to find his center of gravity again. “I’m not a child. I’ll get over this and then I can get back on patrol. I can still do my job!”

“I know that Dick,” Bruce interrupted quietly, still sitting on the bed staring at Dick’s back. “If I’ve made you feel that way…”

“No, you’re not...” Dick brought a hand to his head, clenching his eyes tightly as he turned to face Bruce. “I’m sorry. That’s not what I mean. It’s just …fuck!” Dick grabbed the side of his head, doubling over. Bruce wanted to help him but was afraid to touch the young man and upset him. Instead, he said nothing as Dick groaned before sitting back down beside him on the bed. 

“They fucked with my head, Bruce,” Dick whispered, dropping his hand from his head, looking to the left to where Bruce was watching him intently. “It's at night when I’m trying to sleep and I'm lying there alone I can’t…I’m struggling.”

“Dick,” Bruce whispered back, “with what you went through, I’d be more concerned if you weren’t.”

“But this, I’ve been through worse.” 

“You’ve been through different.”

“This is part of the job though. It’s never taken me this long to shake something off. It’s done with, its over, that’s it.”

“Come on Dick, that’s not how this works, you know that. Our experiences, our emotions don’t work like that. Our emotional lives aren’t linear, it’s not an on and off switch. If they were, we wouldn’t do what we do,” Bruce’s hands lay folded in his lap, his back straight and voice calm and level. It was in these moments that Dick admired Bruce the most. Not when he was the heir of the Wayne family or the Dark Knight, but that man in between that was innately good and kind, that understood Dick’s pain in a way no one else could. It was in these moments between their roles where Bruce and Dick had forged their relationship that would outlast and withstand any disagreement between Nightwing and Batman or any trivial details between Grayson and Wayne.

“I’ve been at this a while now. I’ve been where you are. There are some things, though they don't seem to be the worst we’ve been through, that just mess with us. For whatever reason, physically or mentally, some things just shake us harder than others.”

Dick just nodded, accepting Bruce’s words but not satisfied. He wasn’t used to things getting to him. He had overcome so much in his life, to be scared of his own mind was not something he was ready to take lying down. 

“Bruce,” Dick looked away, unwilling to meet the gaze of his former partner in fighting crime. “He knew who I was. What’s to stop him from coming after me again? Or worse, what if he knows Tim’s identity or yours or-” 

“Let me worry about that. I need you to focus on you,” Bruce interrupted him, putting his hand on Dick’s shoulder. A heavy pause lingered between them as whatever Bruce was going to say next hung in the air. Dick could see it on his face as the older man gathered the thoughts he was trying to form into words. “I know I don’t say it often, or maybe I haven’t said it enough.”

“Bruce, you don’t have to” Dick reached his hand up to clasp Bruce’s that rest upon his shoulder.

“Dick, let me finish,” Bruce took a deep breath before continuing. “I’m proud of you. What you’ve overcome, with all you’ve seen…having me as a role model, it wasn’t easy,” Bruce was pleased when he saw Dick’s small smile form. “You lead with your heart, you have a faith that lets you jump first and worry about a net second. There’s a quote, ‘It’s not the load that breaks you down, it’s the way you carry it.’ You’ve never defined yourself by your traumas, like I have. The way you handle your burdens and demons, Dick, that kind of light that you have in you, I just need you to know that I’m proud of you.”  
Dick didn’t have the opportunity to respond before Bruce pulled him by the shoulder towards him. Dick brought his arms up around Bruce’s shoulders, holding him tight enough that his hand grabbed his own forearm as Bruce wrapped his arms around the boy’s back.

As Bruce hugged him, Dick couldn’t help but muse about how few and far between their hugs had been as they’d both gotten older. When Dick was a kid, Bruce held him whenever he needed comforting, whether it was the heartbreak in mourning his parents’ death, pain or fear when they got home from a night of fighting crime, or reassurance that Bruce was there for him. But then Dick grew up, and those signs of affection turned into a hand clamping on the shoulder, pats on the back of the neck or back. It was usually in the heat of battle, a hand reaching out to touch Dick to either reassure Dick or himself after he was hurt or a close call, making sure the boy was okay and then they’d move on. It wasn’t that they never hugged, but it just didn’t happen often, as if they both grew out of needing it from each other. 

But these past few days, Dick needed it from the man that came to be his family. And it was seeming that Bruce needed it too. The knowing that Dick was still here, that Bruce would always save him, both men needed that connection, that feeling of physical affirmation of being nothing more than a father and his son. It went beyond blood, went beyond just the sign of affection. After this all faded into just a memory, they’d probably go back to a pat on the back or touch of the shoulder. But for now, the silent strength they were giving each other in their father-son dynamic felt as natural to them as their well-versed roles as the once dynamic duo.


	7. Epilogue

Bruce walked slowly and cautiously through the dimly lit hall, bare feet almost moving soundlessly across the wood floor as he approached the door to Dick’s bedroom. 

It was the first night since Dick had been released from Medbay that there were no screams, no shouts for help. Bruce couldn’t relish in the relief until he checked on Dick, to assure himself that the young man he viewed as a son was safe and sound in his bed.

His hand slowly twisted the knob while the other gripped the inner edge of the door as he slowly eased it open. A small stream of low light cast through the room as Bruce peeked his head in, relief instantly washing over him.

Conner slept flat on his back, one of his arms wrapped around Dick who lay curled up on his side, holding him close. Conner’s hand absently brushed at Dick’s upper arm as Dick twitched slightly in his sleep before settling. Conner’s other hand clasped over the one that Dick had entwined in the material of the tank over Conner’s chest. The sheets were tucked up around them and covered their pressed bodies. Dick’s face was smooth in his sleep, an almost peaceful expression Bruce hadn’t seen since they rescued the young man. 

Bruce knew everything wasn’t all right. The fear, tension, and anxiety would stay with Dick, with all of them, for a while as they worked through this. They would take it a day at a time. Grief and struggle weren’t new to them; it had shaped them into the men they were today and they would use this, like their miseries before it, to fuel their nightly fight with the darkness. But tonight at least, as Dick lay sleeping entwined in the arms of someone who cared for him almost as much as the man watching from the doorway, Bruce felt hopeful. He shared the peace he saw on Dick’s face, and for tonight that would suffice. 

 

_____________________________________________

 

Batman said nothing as he watched Nightwing, back turned to him, pull his gauntlets onto his arms. Dick took a few minutes to obsessively ensure all compartments were fully stocked in the gloves and hidden compartments of his uniform. As he bent down to grab his escrima sticks, he quickly turned and with precision hurled at hit at the man lurking in the shadows behind him.

Batman caught in one hand just inches from his face, stepping into the light of the changing area of the cave. He himself was in full gear, cowl hanging behind his neck.

“Your throwing velocity is slower,” he smirked, tossing the stick back to Dick who caught it, holstering them in the back of his uniform.

“I was aiming to smack your stupid face, not knock you out,” Dick smirked back, facing Bruce. 

“Dick,” Bruce started.

“Don’t,” Dick shook his head, sitting on the bench in the center of the room. His hands were clenched into fists resting onto of his knees, eyes staring down at the floor. “I know you’ve tracked down the thugs and are close to finding the Doctor. I’m not asking to tag along on the mission but I need to get back out there on patrol, Bruce. Its been almost a month. I feel good, my injuries are mostly healed. I need to get back to normal. Please. don’t try to talk me out of going on patrol.”

“I wasn’t,” was all Bruce said, pleased by the surprised look on Dick’s face as he moved to stare up at him. He reached out a gloved hand. “Ready to go, partner?”

Dick secured his mask before looking up to Bruce, clasping his outstretched hand in a firm grip. As Bruce pulled Dick to his feet, their gloved hands clasped, Dick wanted to thank him, but he also wanted to make a quip to ease the knot in his chest at the nervousness he was embarrassed of feeling on his first night out on patrol. He wanted to reassure Bruce he was fine but also wanted to throw a punch to prove it. 

Their dynamic was complicated. They were master and apprentice, father and son, brothers and partners all in one messed up package. But Dick was also complicated; simultaneously an optimist with his faith and trust that countered the vigilante lifestyle he leads at night in a constant raging battle against the evil he knew existed out there. This dichotomy they existed between was their normal. So Dick embraced it and knew that much like with the loss of his parents that thrust him into the life of a ward of the richest man in Gotham and the heir to the throne of the Dark Knight, his most recent struggle would, in turn, propel him forward. 

“I’m ready,” was all Dick responded with before patting Bruce on the shoulder and moving past him to head out and move forward.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's the end. Planning a potential sequel...eventually.


End file.
